Bell, Esther (and) Olivier Meslay (and) Alain Chevalier (and) Natasha Coleman — Guillaume Lethiere

Williamstown, MA, Clark Art Institute, 2024. Hardcover. A large casebound book with a color illustrated dust jacket. Contents are as follows: Directors' Foreword -- Acknowledgments -- Lenders to the Exhibition -- Notes to the Reader -- The Worlds of Guillaume Lethière / Esther Bell -- "Né à la Guadaloupe" : Guillaume Lethière, Free Person of Color / Frédéric Régent -- Friendships and Fidelity / Olivier Meslay -- Considering Lethière as Draftsman / Marie-Pierre Salé -- Art and Politics : Revolutions in Pigment (1770-1830) / Anne Lafont -- Lethière and the Community of Caribbean Artists in Paris / Christelle Lozère -- Scenes from the Atelier : Lethière's Pedagogical Legacy / C.C. McKee -- Catalogue / Esther Bell; Alain Chevalier; Natasha Coleman; Darcy Grimaldo Grigsby; Sophie Kerwin; Mehdi Korchane; Frédéric Lacaille; Olivier Meslay; Marie-Pierre Salé; Aaron Wile; Richard Wrigley -- Appendices / Marie-Isabelle Pinet -- Chronology / Sophie Kerwin -- Checklist -- Bibliography -- Exhibitions -- Contributors -- Index -- Photography Credits. "Born in the French colony of Guadeloupe, Guillaume Lethière (1760-1832) was a key figure in the history of art during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The son of a formerly enslaved woman of color and a white government official and plantation owner, Lethière moved to France with his father at age fourteen. He trained as an artist and navigated the tumult of the French Revolution and its aftermath in order to achieve the highest levels of recognition in his time. A favorite artist of Napoleon's brother, Lucien Bonaparte, Lethière also held positions at the Académie de France in Rome, Institut de France, and école des Beaux-Arts. He operated a studio that rivaled those of his contemporaries Jacques-Louis David and Antoine-Jean Gros. Despite his accomplishments and corpus of paintings and drawings, Lethière is relatively unknown today. This study serves to introduce Lethière to new and broader audiences and restore him to his place as one of the most eminent artist of his generation. An international group of scholars offers the first comprehensive view of Lethière's career in its political, social, and art historical context, addressing issues of colonialism, slavery, and diaspora, as well as shedding new light on the presence and reception of Caribbean artists in France during this time. VG+: As new in shrinkwrap .