The Monomaniac of Military Command
Théodore Géricault, 1822
For now, just to look at
The photograph we have of this work is not sharp enough to print at the quality we want, so we are not selling it for now. We are looking for a better one.
About the work
- Artist
- Théodore Géricault
- Date
- 1822
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 86 × 65 cm
- Collection
- Museo Oskar Reinhart "Am Römerholz", Winterthur (Switzerland)
- Reference
- XDV-4088
What the museum label doesn't tell you
Look at the medal hanging from his neck: a cheap metal disc, almost a badge, yet he wears it like an imperial decoration. The tasseled cap wants to be a general's hat too. Géricault doesn't paint a raving madman gesturing wildly, he paints the broken dignity of a man who believes himself a commander while dressed in rags under that brown cloak. This is one of five surviving portraits from a series of ten on monomanias, commissioned by psychiatrist Georget at the Salpêtrière. No caricature here, just clinical, compassionate observation. Which gaze is harder to hold, the madman's or the painter's who refuses to look away?
