Jean-Baptiste Debret

Jean-Baptiste Debret
Manuel Porto-Alegre
Born	(1768-04-18)18 April 1768 Paris, Kingdom of France
Died	28 July 1848(1848-07-28) (aged 80) Paris, French Second Republic
Nationality	French
Alma mater	Académie des Beaux-Arts
Known for	Painting, Drawing
Movement	Neoclassicism
Awards	Prix de Rome Member of the Academie des Beaux Arts.

Jean-Baptiste Debret (French pronunciation:

Biography

Légion d'Honneur, 15 July 1804, at Saint-Louis des Invalides

, by Jean-Baptiste Debret, 1812

Debret studied at the

He travelled to Brazil in March 1816 as a member of the so-called

.

Guarani

family captured by slave hunters

As a painter favored first by the Portuguese court in exile and later by the

in 1826. In 1829 Debret organized the first arts exhibition ever to take place in Brazil, in which he presented many of his works as well as of his disciples. Emulating David's role during the French Empire, Debret was also involved in the drawing ornaments for many of public ceremonies and official festivities of the court and even some of the courtier's uniforms are credited to him.

He corresponded frequently with his brother in Paris. After noticing his brother's interest in his depiction of everyday life in Brazil, he started to sketch street scenes, local costumes and relations of the Brazilians in the period between 1816 and 1831. He took a particular interest in slavery of blacks and in the indigenous peoples in Brazil. Together with the German painter Johann Moritz Rugendas (1802–1858), his work is one of the most important graphic documentation of life in Brazil during the early decades of the 19th century.

Debret returned to France in 1831 and became a member of the

. From 1834 to 1839 he published his monumental series of three volumes of engravings, titled Voyage Pittoresque et Historique au Brésil, ou Séjour d'un Artiste Français au Brésil ("A Picturesque and Historic Voyage to Brazil, or the Sojourn of a French Artist in Brazil"). Unfortunately the work was not a commercial success. In order to survive, he made lithographs depicting paintings by his distant cousin David, but the editions were very limited and money was short. Debret died poor in Paris in 1848.

Gallery

• 
  Uruncungo Player
• 
  “L’exécution de la Punition du Fouet” (“Execution of the Punishment of the Whip”)
• 
  Family dining
• 
  “Feitors corrigeant des nègres” (“Plantation overseers disciplining blacks”)
• 
  Black women (1835)
• 
  Charrúa warrior

References

External links

• Facsimile of the 3 books(color, black& white) and scans of 250 lithographs
• DezenoveVinte - Arte Brasileira do século XIX e início do XX (in Portuguese)