Romanticism1855
The Lion Hunt
Eugène Delacroix
Curator's Eye
"Note the fragmented and vibrant brushwork that seems to dissolve forms into action. The Bordeaux version, though partially mutilated by fire, remains the most flamboyant testimony of Delacroix's fascination with the Orient and animal power."
A whirlwind of fury and color where man and animal blur in a savage struggle for survival. Delacroix brings Romanticism to its peak here, favoring pure emotion and movement over formal precision.
Analysis
Commissioned for the 1855 Universal Exhibition, this monumental canvas marks Delacroix's absolute maturity. The artist draws from his memories of his trip to Morocco (1832) to reinvent the theme of the hunt, no longer as an aristocratic diversion, but as a cosmic confrontation between elementary forces. The figure of the lion, which the artist studied assiduously at the Jardin des Plantes Menagerie, becomes an extension of wild, untamable, and noble nature, opposing the desperate boldness of the Arab riders.
The myth of the hunt in Delacroix's work is part of a long tradition ranging from Rubens to Stradanus, but he injects a new dramatic tension into it. It is not simply about capturing a beast, but about staging the "Sublime" — that mixture of terror and fascination in the face of imminent death. Each brushstroke exalts the resistance of the flesh and the violence of instincts, making the scene a metaphor for the human struggle against fate.
Rubens' influence is here transfigured by a modern sensitivity. Delacroix rejects the neoclassical clarity of Ingres to explore the subjectivity of vision. Space is no longer defined by geometric vanishing lines, but by chromatic contrasts and masses of matter. The spectator is projected into the heart of the fray, where rearing horses, leaping felines, and armed hunters form an inseparable knot of muscles and silent screams.
Finally, the work embodies the concept of Romantic Orientalism. For Delacroix, the Orient is not an ethnographic curiosity, but a conservatory of vital energy that industrialized Europe has lost. This hunt is a return to the sources of heroism, where bravery is not a moral virtue but a physical necessity. The canvas vibrates with a warm, golden light that unifies the apparent chaos in a wild and tragic harmony.
The greatest secret of this work lies in its current physical state. The version kept in Bordeaux is only the lower part of an originally much larger composition. In 1870, a fire devastated the museum, irremediably burning the upper third of the painting. What we see today is a fragment saved from the flames, which explains the strangely tightened composition and the absence of sky, paradoxically reinforcing the effect of suffocation and the intensity of the struggle.
Another secret lies in Delacroix's chromatic preparation. Unlike his contemporaries who used dark backgrounds, Delacroix experimented here with Chevreul's "law of simultaneous contrast." He juxtaposed complementary colors (orange/blue, red/green) to intensify the optical vibration. If one looks closely, the shadows are never black but composed of broken tones of purple and umber, a technique that directly prefigures the Impressionism of Monet and Renoir.
Delacroix maintained an almost obsessive relationship with lions. It is said that he visited the Menagerie as soon as a lion fell ill or died to study its internal anatomy, dissecting muscles to understand the mechanics of jumping. This anatomical secret allows the artist to give the felines a terrifying veracity, far from the frozen heraldic representations of the past. The lion is not a backdrop; it is a motor of pure movement.
Finally, the choice of models for the hunters reveals the intimacy of the studio. Although supposed to be Arab riders, Delacroix used his own servants and sometimes his own reflection to capture expressions of extreme tension. The secret of the expressiveness of these faces lies in the study of Le Brun's passions, reinterpreted through the prism of Romantic fury, transforming each face into a mask of primal survival.
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Why does the version of "The Lion Hunt" kept at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux have such a dense composition lacking any sky?
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