Editing Prix de Rome (section)

==History==
The Prix de Rome was initially created for painters and sculptors in 1663 in France, during the reign of [[Louis XIV]]. It was an annual [[bursary]] for promising artists having proved their talents by completing a very difficult elimination contest. To succeed, a student had to create a sketch on an assigned topic while isolated in a closed booth with no reference material to draw on.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gurney |first1=James |title=Imaginative Realism |date=2009 |publisher=Andrews McMeel Publishing |location=Kansas City Missouri |isbn=978-0-7407-8550-4 |page=11 |edition=1st}}</ref> The prize, organised by the [[Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture]] (Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture), was open to their students. From 1666, the award winner could win a stay of three to five years at the [[Palazzo Mancini]] in Rome at the expense of the King of France. In 1720, the Académie Royale d’Architecture began a prize in architecture. Six painters, four sculptors, and two architects<ref>Lee, S. "Prix de Rome", ''Grove Dictionary of Art online''</ref> would be sent to the [[French Academy in Rome]] founded by [[Jean-Baptiste Colbert]] from 1666.

Expanded after 140 years into five categories, the contest started in 1663 as two categories: painting and sculpture. Architecture was added in 1720. In 1803, music was added, and after 1804 there was a ''prix'' for engraving as well. The primary winner took the "First Grand Prize" (called the ''agréé''),<ref>Clarke, Michael. ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms'', Oxford University Press, 2001</ref> and the "Second Prizes" were awarded to the runners-up.

In 1803, [[Napoleon|Napoleon Bonaparte]] moved the French Academy in Rome to the [[Villa Medici]], with the intention of preserving an institution once threatened by the [[French Revolution]]. At first, the villa and its gardens were in a sad state, and they had to be renovated in order to house the winners of the Prix de Rome. In this way, he hoped to retain for young French artists the opportunity to see and copy the masterpieces of antiquity and the Renaissance.

[[Jacques-Louis David]], having failed to win the prize three years in a row, considered suicide. [[Édouard Manet]], [[Edgar Degas]], [[Ernest Chausson]], and [[Maurice Ravel]] attempted the Prix de Rome but did not gain recognition. Ravel tried a total of five times to win the prize, and the last failed attempt in 1905 was so controversial that it led to a complete reorganization of the administration at the [[Paris Conservatory]].

During [[World War II]] (1939–45), the prize winners were accommodated in the [[Villa Paradiso]] in [[Nice, France|Nice]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://enligne.cg06.fr/jean-moulin/bottaro.html|last=Moulin|first=Jean|year=2014|publisher=Conseil général des Alpes-Maritimes|title=Nice, cité-refuge ?|access-date=2015-01-28}}</ref>
The Prix de Rome was abolished in 1968 by [[André Malraux]], who was Minister of Culture at the time. Since then, a number of contests have been created, and the academies, together with the [[Institut de France]], were merged by the State and the Minister of Culture. Selected residents now have an opportunity for study during an 18-month (sometimes 2-year) stay at The Academy of France in Rome, which is accommodated in the Villa Medici.

The heyday of the Prix de Rome was during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.<ref>Lee, ''ibid''</ref> It was later imitated by the [[Abd-el-Tif prize|Prix Abd-el-Tif]] and the [[Villa Abd-el-Tif]] in Algiers, 1907–1961, and later [[Prix d'Indochine]] including a bursary to visit the [[École des Beaux-Arts de l'Indochine]] in [[Hanoi]], 1920–1939, and bursary for residence at the [[Casa de Velázquez]] in [[Madrid]], 1929–present.