Despite an admiration for his mentors that never wavered, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) forged his own unique style, a combination of virtuoso realism and strange distortions that was to make him one of the greatest painters of his century. Both highly praised and heavily criticized, this pupil of David and lover of the italian Renaissance, classical art and ideal beauty, was hugely admired as the saviour of traditional painting from the vagaries of the Romantics. But his work's fascination lay in his portraits and odalisques rather than his history paintings, and it is these that inspired some of the most avant-garde artists of t twentieth century.
