Georges de La Tour, realism and spirituality

Conference by Serge Legat, historian and lecturer

Famous in his own time, Georges de La Tour (1593 - 1652), born into a family of bakers from Lorraine, disappeared from the art scene for almost two and a half centuries.
From 1915 onwards, Hermann Voss restored him to the forefront of 17th-century art.

Close to the Caravaggesque in his subjects (fortune-tellers, tricksters, etc.), the artist asserts a profound spirituality in his religious paintings, transcended by chiaroscuro, where the flame of a candle humanizes the divine figures and gives his paintings a feeling of great intimacy, even secrecy and mystery.

This master of tenebrism was celebrated by writers from René Char to André Malraux.
“He made night his kingdom": Pascal Quignard.