Jean-Léon Gérôme

Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904) was born at Vesoul and went to Paris at sixteen to study under Paul Delaroche, whom he accompanied to Italy in 1843. On his return he spent a short time in the studio of Charles Gleyre and then attended the École des Beaux-Arts. The Cock Fight won him a medal at the Salon of 1847 and launched his career. His range took in history painting, Greek mythology, religious commissions, portraits and, after his first visit to Egypt in 1856, a long run of Orientalist subjects. He ranked with Meissonier and Cabanel among the most successful artists of the Second Empire, and by 1880 wide reproduction of his paintings may have made him the most famous living artist anywhere. He was also a sculptor. Between 1864 and 1904 more than 2,000 students passed through his atelier at the École des Beaux-Arts, among them Mary Cassatt, Thomas Eakins and Odilon Redon. Here: The Christian Martyrs' Last Prayer.