This print is based on the work Leonidas at Thermopylae by the French painter Jacques-Louis David.
The Ultimes are prints made from the original etching plates in the Chalcographie collection at the Musée du Louvre before they were put into storage for preservation reasons.
For reasons of preservation...
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This print is based on the work Leonidas at Thermopylae by the French painter Jacques-Louis David.
The Ultimes are prints made from the original etching plates in the Chalcographie collection at the Musée du Louvre before they were put into storage for preservation reasons.
For reasons of preservation, it was decided to stop printing plates engraved before 1848. Before they left the Ateliers to go into the Louvre's reserves, some were printed one last time. These are the last ones. Each print is dated, numbered and stamped, and is sold with a certificate of authenticity, in a limited edition of 10.
This print was engraved by Jean-Nicolas Laugier (1785-1865) in 1814 after a painting by the French painter Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825). The painting celebrates the sacrifice of King Leonidas I and his 300 Spartans in 480 BC. Cornered by the Persian army, they continued to fight in order to evacuate the population and give themselves time to prepare their response.
Characteristic of the neoclassical style, this episode was used as a pretext to show naked men in postures that emphasised their muscularity and were very much inspired by ancient Greco-Roman statuary, the symbol of the "beautiful ideal".
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