An Interpretive Study of Prints on the French Revolution

My analysis of nine prints from the collection considers the "crowd" as participants in, as well as witnesses to, the major events of the French Revolution. Descriptions of the revolutionary "crowd" in the images from this selection demonstrate the crowd's capacity to endorse or discredit prevailing political forces. That is, artists portray members of the crowd as either the instigators of political action or as objects of opposing ridicule. In many prints, the ideological position of the artist/artisan establishes the interpretive point of view for representations of the revolutionary crowd. Those artists who sympathize with the revolution tend to portray crowd members as heroic agents who embody reason, order, and justice in their efforts to unseat or destroy vestiges from the "old regime." Such pro-revolutionary artists often incorporate neoclassical elements such as linearity and symmetry as well as seriousness and decorum to give the composition aesthetic and political credibility. Revolutionary artists also provide architectural solidity, dimension, and weight as background for the unusual rendition of the crowd's participation in politics. In contrast, those artisans at odds with the revolution often portray crowd members as frenzied, mad, and bestial, or as the ludicrous embodiment of revolutionary folly. The reactionary or counter-revolutionary artist thereby lambastes revolutionary figures by locating his characters in outlandish, uncivil, or chaotic situations beyond the pale of civilized order. More specifically, counterrevolutionary artists often try to discredit traditional or symbolic representatives of the revolution through caricature and ridicule.