Home Online catalogues True to Nature. Open-air Painting 1780-1870 2. Fleury François Richard (Fleury-Richard) Lyon 1777 – 1852 Écully, Rhône An Artist in Renaissance Costume Sketching in the Arena of Nîmes, 1822(?) Fleury-Richard was a pupil of David and an exponent of the style troubadour, a genre of historical painting featuring idealised Medieval and Renaissance subjects. Accordingly, the figures who populate this view of the Arena of Nîmes are dressed in early sixteenth-century costume. He includes an artist at work in the lower right who, in line with the practice that prevailed during that time period, is drawing rather than painting. Until the late eighteenth century, painting in oils was largely confined to the studio. For landscape and history painters, however, close study of nature and classical ruins was essential, and plein air oil sketches emerged from a long tradition of drawing on the spot.
Fleury-Richard was a pupil of David and an exponent of the style troubadour, a genre of historical painting featuring idealised Medieval and Renaissance subjects. Accordingly, the figures who populate this view of the Arena of Nîmes are dressed in early sixteenth-century costume. He includes an artist at work in the lower right who, in line with the practice that prevailed during that time period, is drawing rather than painting. Until the late eighteenth century, painting in oils was largely confined to the studio. For landscape and history painters, however, close study of nature and classical ruins was essential, and plein air oil sketches emerged from a long tradition of drawing on the spot.