L'apoteosi di Omero

This began as a ceiling. In 1827 the state asked Ingres to decorate a room in the new Charles X museum inside the Louvre, and the king wanted it done inside a single year. Ingres answered with a vision of the ancient poet Homer being crowned in front of a Greek temple, surrounded by 44 figures who owe him a debt, poets, philosophers and artists lined up in careful symmetry like a creed made visible. It was his statement of faith in the old classical rules. The timing sharpened it. That same year Delacroix showed his wild, blood-soaked Death of Sardanapalus at the Salon, and the two canvases read as opposite arguments about what painting should be. The ceiling version was taken down in 1855 and replaced with a copy; the picture you see is the original composition.