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How did Charles Le Brun use Nicolas Poussin’s ideas in the French Academy?
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Nicolas Poussin
Adoration of the Golden Calf, oil on canvas by Nicolas Poussin, c. 1634. 153.4 × 211.8 cm.
Charles Le Brun, as director of the French Academy, transformed the artistic theories of Nicolas Poussin into a rigid set of academic rules that governed art education and criticism.1
Le Brun institutionalized Poussin’s "grand manner" of classicism, which emphasized rational, disciplined composition over the use of color. By codifying these ideas, Le Brun established the following principles within the Academy:21
- Supremacy of Drawing: Le Brun officially declared that while color might satisfy the eyes, drawing (disegno) was superior because it satisfied the mind.2
- Classical Authority: He enforced the belief that classical art and antiquity—rather than nature—should serve as the primary model for artists.1
- Restraint and Narrative: Following Poussin’s preference for the "Dorian mode," Le Brun promoted a style characterized by stability, gravity, and restraint, focusing on grandiose subjects like heroic or religious narratives while rejecting "base" genre scenes.1
Under Le Brun’s leadership, these concepts became the "gospel" of the Academy, though critics later argued that his dogmatic application of these rules often stifled the creativity Poussin had originally intended to be a rational approach.1