Honoré Fragonard (13 June 1732 – 5 April 1799) was a French

anatomist Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its ...

, now remembered primarily for his remarkable collection of ''

écorché An ''écorché'' () is a figure drawn, painted, or sculpted showing the muscles of the body without skin, normally as a figure study for another work or as an exercise for a student artist. The Renaissance-era architect, theorist and all-around R ...

s'' (flayed figures) in the

Musée Fragonard d'Alfort The Musée Fragonard d'Alfort, often simply the Musée Fragonard, is a museum of anatomical oddities located within the École Nationale Vétérinaire de Maisons-Alfort, 7 avenue du Général de Gaulle, in Maisons-Alfort, a suburb of Paris. It is ...

. Fragonard was born in

Grasse Grasse (; Provençal dialect, Provençal oc, Grassa in classical norm or in Mistralian norm ; traditional it, Grassa) is the only Subprefectures in France, subprefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes Departments of France, department in the Provence- ...

as cousin to painter

Jean-Honoré Fragonard Jean-Honoré Fragonard (; 5 April 1732 (birth/baptism certificate) – 22 August 1806) was a French painter and printmaker whose late Rococo manner was distinguished by remarkable facility, exuberance, and hedonism. One of the most prolific ar ...

. After studying surgery, in 1759 he obtained his license and in 1762 was recruited by

Claude Bourgelat Claude Bourgelat (27 March 1712 – 3 January 1779) was a French veterinary surgeon. He was a founder of scientifically informed veterinary medicine, and he created one of the earliest schools for training professional veterinarians. Life an ...

, founder of the world's first veterinary school in

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

. There Fragonard began to make his first anatomical exhibits. In 1765

Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (french: le Bien-Aimé), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reache ...

initiated a veterinary school in Paris, first resident at rue Sainte Appoline but in 1766 moving to the suburb of Alfort (today the

École nationale vétérinaire d'Alfort The National veterinary school of Alfort ( or ''ENVA'') is a French public institution of scientific research and higher education in veterinary medicine, located in Maisons-Alfort, Val-de-Marne, close to Paris. It is operated under the superv ...

Maisons-Alfort Maisons-Alfort () is a commune in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris. Maisons-Alfort is famous as the location of the National Veterinary School of Alfort. The Fort de Charenton, constructed betwe ...

). There Fragonard served as the school's first professor of anatomy for six years, preparing thousands of anatomical pieces, but was expelled in 1771 as a madman. His ostentatious specimens were housed among many other objects of natural history and comparative anatomy. He subsequently continued to prepare dissections in his home, gaining income by selling his works to the aristocracy. Fragonard was careful in his dissections and preserved the results via means never divulged, but which may have been based on those of

Jean-Joseph Sue Prof Jean-Joseph Sue FRS FRSE (20 April 1710 – 15 December 1792) was a French surgeon and anatomist. Life He was born at La Colle-sur-Loup on 20 April 1710 the son of Pierre Jean Sue (d.1714) and his wife, Marguerite Bellisime (d.1748). Jean-J ...

. His pieces were often prepared for theatrical effect rather than scientific exhibition, as can be seen in the surviving pieces in the

. In 1793, along with his cousin, he became a member of the Jury national des arts, and in the following year the ''Commission temporaire des arts''. In this position he collected his work at Alfort for an envisioned ''Office national d'anatomie''; but it never materialized and most of his work was dispersed. Despondent, he subsequently was named director of anatomy at the newly created École de santé de Paris, but died in Charenton on 5 April 1799.

Honoré Fragonard in fiction

*Honoré Fragonard appears in a brief but important role in Susanne Alleyn's historical mystery novel ''The Cavalier of the Apocalypse'' (2009). *Fragonard is the central character of the French novel ''Le Cousin de Fragonard'' (2006) by Patrick Roegiers. *Fragonard and one of his works is mentioned in the novel ''

Austerlitz Austerlitz may refer to: History * Battle of Austerlitz, an 1805 victory by the French Grand Army of Napoleon Bonaparte Places * Austerlitz, German name for Slavkov u Brna in the Czech Republic, which gave its name to the Battle of Austerlitz a ...

'' (2001) by

W.G. Sebald Winfried Georg Sebald (18 May 1944 – 14 December 2001), known as W. G. Sebald or (as he preferred) Max Sebald, was a German writer and academic. At the time of his death at the age of 57, he was being cited by literary critics as one of the g ...

References

* * Jonathan Simon, "Honoré Fragonard, anatomical virtuoso", in ''Science and Spectacle in the European Enlightenment'', edited by Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent and Christine Blondel, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2008. * Marc Mammerickx, ''Claude Bourgelat, avocat des vétérinaires'', 1971.
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Fragonard, Honore 1732 births 1799 deaths People from Grasse French anatomists

Honoré Fragonard in fiction

See also

References