Jean-Baptiste Berré or Jan Baptist Berré

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

, 11 February 1777 – Paris, 6 May 1839) was a Flemish painter and sculptor.Jean-Baptiste Berré
at the

Netherlands Institute for Art History The Netherlands Institute for Art History or RKD (Dutch: RKD-Nederlands Instituut voor Kunstgeschiedenis), previously Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatie (RKD), is located in The Hague and is home to the largest art history center i ...

He trained in Antwerp where he painted mainly still lifes.Lievin Amand Marie De Bast, ''Annales du salon de Gand et de l'école moderne des Pays Bas. Recueil de morceaux choisis parmi les ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture et gravure, exposés au Musée en 1820''
P. F. de Goesin, 1823, p 144 He later moved to Paris where he made a name as an

animalier An animalier (, ) is an artist, mainly from the 19th century, who specializes in, or is known for, skill in the realistic portrayal of animals. "Animal painter" is the more general term for earlier artists. Although the work may be in any genre ...

painter and sculptor.Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, ''Catalogue du Musée d'Anvers''
Buschmann, 1857, pp. 386-387 His patrons included members of the court during the

First French Empire The First French Empire, officially the French Republic, then the French Empire (; Latin: ) after 1809, also known as Napoleonic France, was the empire ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte, who established French hegemony over much of continental Eu ...

and the

First Restoration The First Restoration was a period in French history that saw the return of the Bourbon dynasty to the throne, between the abdication of Napoleon I in the spring of 1814 and the Hundred Days, in March 1815. The regime was born following the vict ...

. He was employed as an official painter at the Jardin du Roi in Paris.Denis Coekelberghs et Pierre Loze, ''1770-1830 : autour du néo-classicisme en Belgique'', Crédit Communal, 1985, p. 280 In this role he was chosen as one of the artists invited to portray

Sarah Baartman Sarah Baartman (; 1789– 29 December 1815), also spelt Sara, sometimes in the diminutive form Saartje (), or Saartjie, and Bartman, Bartmann, was a Khoikhoi woman who was exhibited as a freak show attraction in 19th-century Europe under the n ...

, the 'Hottentot Venus', in 1815.Berte van Wyk, D. Adeniji-Neill, ''Indigenous Concepts of Education: Toward Elevating Humanity for All Learners'', Springer, 2014

Life

Berré was born in Antwerp on 11 February 1777. He entered the studio of a decorative painter at a very young age. At the same time spent time copying old master paintings. He enrolled at the Academy of Antwerp where he studied, among others, with Balthasar Paul Ommeganck, a renowned animal painter. In 1800 he became a member of the newly established ''Genootschap der Kunsten'' (''Society for the arts''). This was an organisation set up at the initiative of

Mattheus Ignatius van Bree Mattheus Ignatius van Bree (Antwerp, 1773 – Antwerp, 1839) was a Belgian painter. He was one of the founders of the historical school of painting in Belgium and played an important role as a teacher in the development of 19th-century Belgian a ...

and included initially Berré himself, Jan van Bree, Lambrecht Dentijn, Jan Carpentero, Ferdinand Verhoeven, Peter Iven, Michiel Dierickxen, Jan Peeters and others. The members undertook to meet monthly to show and discuss their works and enjoy the tuition of the older generation of painters such as Ommeganck and

Willem Jacob Herreyns Willem Jacob HerreynsName variations: Guillaume Jacques Herreyns, Willem Jacob Herreijns, Willem Jacob Herrijns, Willem Jacob Herryns, Guillaume Jacques Herreijns (Antwerp, 10 June 1743 – Antwerp, 10 August 1827) was a Flemish painter of histor ...

who were invited to act as teachers of the members. At the end of 1800 the pre-existing artist organisation ''Konstmaatschappij'', which had been established in 1788, was merged with the ''Genootschap der Kunsten''. The merged organisation would organise an annual exhibition of its members' works.Frans Jozef Peter Van den Branden, ''Geschiedenis der Antwerpsche schilderschool'', Antwerpen, 1883, pp. 1307-1308 From 1802 onwards Berré regularly participated in the Antwerp and Ghent Salons. He presented a religious painting (a Mater Dolorosa) in Antwerp in 1802. The majority of his works consisted of still lifes, landscapes and animals. Berré left Antwerp for Paris in 1808. He took part in the exhibition at the Napoleonic Museum in the same year. He earned his living by reproducing his own paintings on serving trays. The story goes that

Empress Josephine An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife ( empress consort), mother (empr ...

noticed one of these objects at a picnic. This resulted in a demand for his work from France's high society. At the Salon of 1810, he exhibited a ''Lioness with lion cubs'' on varnished sheet metal, commissioned by the Empress. Finding success with the theme of wild animals, Berré started to concentrate on representations of wild animals such as lions, tigers, snakes, etc. which he studied from nature at the Jardin du Roi. This subject appealed to the taste for exoticism of his bourgeois clientele. At the same time he still painted landscapes and domestic animals with pastoral scenes. He was given a lodging and place for a workshop at the Jardin du Roi in 1812. The French naturalist Pierre Antoine Delalande took art classes from him there.Delalande, Pierre Antoine
at JSTOR Global Plants He sent his works to various exhibitions organized in his home country. He sent the ''Royal Eagle about to snatch a lamb'' to the Brussels Salon of 1811, the ''Monkey and the Cat'' to the Ghent Salon of 1812, ''Dogs and Swans'' to the Ghent Salon of 1814, ''Stags and Hinds in a Forest'' to the Brussels Salon of 1821, a ''Landscape with an Oxen Cart'' to the Amsterdam Salon of 1822 and ''Resting Animals and Figures'' to the Ghent Salon of 1823. His works fetched high prices and were collected throughout Europe. At the Paris Salon of 1814 he exhibited the painting ''Romulus and Remus suckled by the she-wolf''.Ad. Siret, ''BERRÉ, Jean-Baptiste''s
in Biographie Nationale, Volume 2, p. 289-292 This harmless painting became politically charged at one point when Berré produced copies of it showing an imperial eagle killing all kinds of animals. In the spring of 1815, Berré formed together with

Léon de Wailly Armand François Léon de Wailly (28 July 1804 – 25 April 1864) was a 19th-century French novelist, playwright, adaptor and translator. Biography Born into a family of writers and academics, graduated from the École des chartes, Léon de W ...

and Nicolas Huet the team of resident artists of the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...

in Paris who were tasked with painting a portrait of

Saartjie Baartman Sarah Baartman (; 1789– 29 December 1815), also spelt Sara, sometimes in the diminutive form Saartje (), or Saartjie, and Bartman, Bartmann, was a Khoikhoi woman who was exhibited as a freak show attraction in 19th-century Europe under the n ...

. Saartjie Baartman was a

Khoisan Khoisan , or (), according to the contemporary Khoekhoegowab orthography, is a catch-all term for those indigenous peoples of Southern Africa who do not speak one of the Bantu languages, combining the (formerly "Khoikhoi") and the or ( in t ...

maidservant from the Cape Colony who at the age of 21 years had been smuggled to London. Here she had become a stage performer who attracted a large public because of her ethnic features including a very large buttocks. In 1814 she came to France. A panel of leading scientists and naturalists led by

Georges Cuvier Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, Baron Cuvier (; 23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier, was a French natural history, naturalist and zoology, zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuvier ...

conducted a 'scientific' research of Baartman. As part if this, the three resident artists produced their portraits. The delicate watercolour portraits which they made of her figure were widely reproduced and became collectible popular art.Rachel Holmes, ''Flesh made fantasy''
in the Guardian of 31 Mar 2007 His success did not diminish with the fall of the Empire in 1815. In 1817 he made a painting showing a visit made by the

Duke Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are ran ...

and

Duchess of Berry Duke of Berry (french: Duc de Berry) or Duchess of Berry (french: Duchesse de Berry) was a title in the Peerage of France. The Duchy of Berry, centred on Bourges, was originally created as an appanage for junior members of the French royal family ...

to the menagerie of the Royal Garden, on the occasion of the arrival in Paris of one of the first elephants from India. His paintings were present in all the major collections of the

and are currently distributed in many French provincial museums. In 1825 he was made an honorary member of the Royal Society of Brussels. He remained in Paris for the rest of his career and died there on 6 May 1839.

Work

Berré painted still lifes, landscapes and animals. His works were appreciated for their finish and the perfection of their execution. He was known for the technical quality and finish of his works. Berré's bright and warm colours are in the tradition of Dutch and Flemish painting. The study of nature allowed him to render animals with great fidelity. He typically did not paint the staffage in his works but asked specialist painters to take care of this. Thus in his ''Romulus and Remus suckled by the she-wolf'' exhibited in Paris in 1814, the two figures are believed to be by the hand of

. Berré also worked as a sculptor. His sculptural work consists entirely of the representation of animals in plaster or bronze.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Berre, Jean-Baptiste Animal painters Flemish still life painters Flemish landscape painters Flemish sculptors (before 1830) Artists from Antwerp 18th-century Flemish painters 19th-century Flemish painters 1777 births 1839 deaths