General de Brigade

[Eugene1809]

Hi to all,

Recently our club awarded our long serving Treasurer a framed print of the painting mentioned above that also adorns the cover of everyone of our copies of GdB.

Following up in our club newsletter was some interesting information on the painting which inspired me to recently visit the Art Gallery of New South Wales whilst in Sydney last week for business to see the painting first hand. I thought I might share some details.

The picture depicts the charge of the French 4th Hussars on June 14th, 1807 at the battle of Friedland and was completed in the early 1890's.

Firstly, the size of he painting truly surprised me. Having been fortunate to visit Invalides, Versaille etc large scale paintings are not new to me however it truly dominated the wing of the gallery and drew everyone to it.




It was purchased in 1893 for the pricely sum of 3000 pounds which happened to be 80% of the galleries acquisition budget that year. In 1959, after years of being mainly in storage, the painting was quite seriously water damaged during a storm and it was virtually deemed unsalvageble.

Out of sight out of mind...

Forty years later, funds were raised to restore the famous painting and this was commenced in full public view in 2002.

It was well worth the trip across from the rocks and, as you can see in the photograph, certainly impressed me!

Cheers

Carlo

[Eclaireur]

Carlo
great to see it - thanks for sharing had no idea it had ended up down under...
EC

[baxterj]

Carlo, that is a cracking piece of art. IIRC, it was the painting that got Don Troiani interested in battle paintings. I am up in Sydney next week and will have to go and have a look.

JB

[PrimusPilus]

I had no idea the painting was so huge!

No wonder people could not help themselves to stop and stare.

Thanks for the picy

Happy Gaming,

Allan

[Milhaud]

Hi Carlo,

I've got a print of this hanging in my study - about a quarter of the size!

Thanks for sharing,
_________________
Cheers,
Mark