Ingres, JEAN DOMINIQUE AUGUSTE, French painter, was born at Montauban, 15th September 1781. He became a pupil of David in 1796, and five years later gained the 'Grand Prix.' In 1806 he proceeded to Rome, where he resided for fourteen years. He then spent four years in Florence, where he painted 'The Vow of Louis XIII.,' a picture which, on being exhibited at the Paris
Academy in 1824, broke down the indifference of the public to the work of Ingres. In Italy he had adhered to the style of David, but had modified it by the inspiration he got from Raphael and other old masters. To this period belong his best portraits, and his 'Edipus and the Sphinx,' 'Venus Anadyomene,' 'Romulus and Acon,' 'Virgil reading the Aneid,' 'Raphael and Fornarina,' 'Roger and Angélique.' Returning to Paris in 1826, Ingres was appointed professor of Fine Arts at the Academy, and became the recognised head of a great school. But the acrimonious criticisms passed upon his 'Apotheosis of Homer' (1827) and 'Martyrdom of St Symphorian' (1834) made him gladly embrace the opportunity of succeeding Horace Vernet as director of the French Academy in Rome in 1834. There he painted 'Stratonice' and the 'Portrait of Cherubini.' The exhibition of these and other pictures in Paris at length turned the tide of popular admiration full and strong in his favour. He relied more upon form and line than upon colour; some of his best productions ('Girl after Bathing,' 'Edipus and the Sphinx,' the 'Odalisque,' and the 'Fountain'), compositions of a few figures each, are unquestionably deserving of admiration; but of late it is commonly held that for a time he was unduly overrated. At the exhibition of 1855 he was awarded the grand medal of honour for his collection of pictures, and was nominated a grand officer of the Legion of Honour. He returned to Paris in 1841, and died there on 14th January 1867. See Lives by Delaborde (1870), Blanc (1870), and Schmarsow (1884; in Dohme's Kunst und Künstler).