Ingres As Proto-Modernist

Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) painted at a time in French history when the boundaries were beginning to blur between the Classical ideals of the past and new, more Romantic ways of thinking about art and creativity. Although Ingres was a self-labeled Neoclassicist, he was working in a period when Romantic concepts were almost inborn among the artistic community. It is this fact that leads this paper to argue that Ingres serves as a prime example of the early transition from Classical ideas in art to the later Modern aesthetic. His undeclared affinities with Romanticism provide the bridge between these artistic eras.