Editing Jacques-Louis David (section)

==Portraiture==
In addition to his history paintings, David completed a number of privately commissioned portraits. Warren Roberts, among others, has pointed out the contrast between David's "public style" of painting, as shown in his history paintings, and his "private style", as shown in his portraits.<ref name="RobertsWarren">{{Harvnb|Roberts|1992|pp=42–45}}.</ref> His portraits were characterized by a sense of truth and realism. He focused on defining his subjects' features and characters without idealizing them.{{sfn|Bordes|2005}}{{page needed|date=November 2021}} This is different from the style seen in his historical paintings, in which he idealizes his figures' features and bodies to align with Greek and Roman ideals of beauty.<ref>Wilson, Elizabeth Barkley. "Jacques-Louis David." Smithsonian 29, no. 5 (August 1998): 80. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed 18 November 2017).</ref> He puts a great deal of detail into his portraits, defining smaller features such as hands and fabric. The compositions of his portraits remain simple with blank backgrounds that allow the viewer to focus on the details of the subject.

The portrait he did of [[Marguerite Charlotte Pécoul|his wife]] (1813) is an example of his typical portrait style.<ref name="RobertsWarren"/> The background is dark and simple without any clues as to the setting, which forces the viewer to focus entirely on her. Her features are un-idealized and truthful to her appearance.<ref name="RobertsWarren"/> There is a great amount of detail that can be seen in his attention to portraying the satin material of the dress she wears, the drapery of the scarf around her, and her hands which rest in her lap.

[[File:Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès - crop.jpg|thumb|upright|alt=|''[[Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès]]'', 1817]]
In the painting of Brutus (1789), the man and his wife are separated, both morally and physically. Paintings such as these, depicting the great strength of patriotic sacrifice, made David a popular hero of the revolution.<ref name="RobertsWarren" />

In the ''[[Portrait of Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and his wife]]'' (1788), the man and his wife are tied together in an intimate pose. She leans on his shoulder while he pauses from his work to look up at her. David casts them in a soft light, not in the sharp contrast of Brutus or of the Horatii. Also of interest—Lavoisier was a tax collector, as well as a famous chemist. Though he spent some of his money trying to clean up swamps and eradicate malaria, he was nonetheless sent to the guillotine during the Reign of Terror as an enemy of the people. David, then a powerful member of the National Assembly, stood idly by and watched.<ref>{{Harvnb|Roberts|1992|pp=43–45}}.</ref>

Other portraits include paintings of his sister-in-law and her husband, Madame and Monsieur Seriziat. The picture of Monsieur Seriziat depicts a man of wealth, sitting comfortably with his horse-riding equipment. The picture of the Madame shows her wearing an unadorned white dress, holding her young child's hand as they lean against a bed. David painted these portraits of Madame and Monsieur Seriziat out of gratitude for letting him stay with them after he was in jail.<ref>Lajer-Burcharth, Ewa. “Necklines: The Art of Jacques-Louis David After the Terror.” New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999.</ref>

Towards the end of David's life, he painted a portrait of his old friend ''[[Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès|Abbé Sieyès]]''. Both had been involved in the Revolution, both had survived the purging of political radicals that followed the reign of terror.