Ingres, described by Baudelaire as a painter of "profound sensual delights," has not always been acknowledged as such by the art world. Famous for his iconic paintings The Grand Odalisque and The Turkish Bath, Ingres was also an artist of great erotic intensity and raw sexuality. These facets of his oeuvre are explored here in depth and in detail. The sixty-five illustrations include drawings and sketches from the artist's personal notebooks, lush details from his paintings, and even a rare daguerreotype. Medieval engravings from the sixteenth century are reproduced alongside the sketches that they inspired, and studies for Ingres' famous paintings appear adjacent to the corresponding details. Stéphane Guégan unveils this unexplored aspect of the artist's works through the themes of a virile eros, temptation, seduction, voyeurism, close-ups, forbidden desires, saturation, and enigma. The volume includes a chronology of the artist's life and a selected bibliography. This handful of hidden treasures, shocking enough in their time to be banished from polite society, today rewards a thorough examination with a new and enlightening perspective on Ingres: the artist, the man of flesh and blood, the seducer.

About The Author

Stéphane Guégan is an art historian, art critic, and head of the cultural department at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, France. His many published works include books on Gaugin, Delacroix, and Chassériau. He was curator of the exhibitions Chassériau: The Unknown Romantic at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Grand Palais in Paris, and the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Strasbourg and Ingres (1780-1867) at the Louvre in Paris (2006).