Imaginary interview with Eugène Delacroix
by Charactorium · Eugène Delacroix (1798 — 1863) · Visual Arts · 5 min read
Two young visitors, barely twelve years old, push open the door of a sunlit studio on Place Furstenberg. Amid the canvases and sketchbooks brought back from Morocco, an elegant man sets down his brushes and smiles at them. Eugène Delacroix agrees to answer all their questions.
—How old were you when you painted the woman waving the flag?
You know, I was 32 years old, in 1830. For three days, the people of Paris had been fighting in the streets against King Charles X. It's called the Three Glorious Days. People built barricades — imagine a big pile of cobblestones, barrels, and furniture stacked across the street to block the soldiers. I didn't take up a rifle. But I wanted to keep that moment alive. So I painted a woman walking over the cobblestones, holding the tricolor flag. She doesn't really exist: it's Liberty herself advancing.
—Did you regret not fighting in the street with the others?
A little, yes. My heart was heavy. Others had risked their lives, and I stayed with my brushes. But in October 1830, I wrote to my friend Charles Soulier a sentence I never forgot: « I have begun a modern subject, a barricade… and if I have not conquered for the fatherland, at least I will paint for her. » Do you understand? Everyone serves their country in their own way. The soldier with his courage. The painter with his canvas. My weapon was color.
Everyone serves their country in their own way — my weapon was color.
—Is it true that another painter made you repaint your whole picture?
Almost! In 1824, I was exhibiting my Scenes of the Massacres of Chios, a large canvas about the Greeks' misfortune. Right next to it, they had hung paintings by an Englishman, John Constable. His colors shone — imagine grass still wet with dew, in full sunlight. I was shocked. I only had a few days left before the Salon, the big exhibition where all Paris came to judge painters. Do you know what I did? I reworked the entire background of my canvas, in a hurry, to make it more luminous. A painter should never be ashamed to learn from others.
—For you, what was the most important thing in a painting?
Color, my child, always color! In my Journal — that notebook where I wrote down my thoughts in the evening — I wrote: « The first virtue of a painting is to be a feast for the eye. » A feast, can you imagine? Even before understanding the story being told, your eye must be happy. I had noticed something astonishing: two neighboring colors awaken each other. Put red next to green, and both seem more vivid. A scholar, Chevreul, called it simultaneous contrast. I felt it instinctively, just with my palette.
—Is it true you went very far, all the way to Africa?
Yes! In 1832, I accompanied the Comte de Mornay on a great journey to Morocco. For me, it was a dazzlement. Imagine: you have lived your whole life under the gray sky of Paris, and suddenly the light floods you, so strong that it makes every color sing. The red clothes, the white walls, the deep blue sky… In Tangier, then in Meknes, I even attended an audience with the sultan. I had never seen anything so beautiful. That journey changed my painting forever.
—What did you bring back from those journeys? Souvenirs?
Treasures! I filled little sketchbooks with drawings and watercolors. Seven sketchbooks in all. Inside, I would draw a face, a costume, and write next to it the exact color I saw. That was my way of catching the light before it fled. Back in Paris, for nearly thirty years, I reopened those sketchbooks. Each time, Morocco came back before my eyes. I painted more than a hundred paintings thanks to them. You see, a sketchbook is a bit like a box where you store your emotions for later.
—They say you were the leader of the modern painters. Did you agree?
Not really! It even made me smile. One day, I wrote to a critic, Théophile Thoré: « I am a pure classic. » I had grown up admiring the old masters, Raphael, Rubens. I would go copy them at the Louvre. And yet I was ranked among the innovators, those who break the rules! They called it Romanticism: a painting that shows emotion, movement, passion, rather than neat lines. I just wanted to be free. Labels, you see, are for bottles, not for painters.
Labels are for bottles, not for painters.
—Is it true you argued with another painter?
Oh, Ingres! He and I were like fire and water. He loved clean drawing, perfect lines. I loved color and movement. One evening at a dinner, our argument got so heated that he stormed out shouting: « Open the windows, it smells of sulfur! » Sulfur, you know, is the smell attributed to the devil. He almost called me a demon of painting! The Académie des beaux-arts, which sided with him, rejected me seven times. Seven! I only entered in 1857. But I never gave up. Patience is also a talent.
—What was your home like at the end of your life?
From 1857, I lived in a small apartment with a studio and a garden, at Place Furstenberg, in the heart of Paris. It was calm and gentle. I was often ill — I had a weak chest, what they then called consumption. A woman watched over me, my faithful housekeeper Jenny Le Guillou. She oversaw my meals, simple and light. In the morning, I got up early to take advantage of the light. In the afternoon, I painted with feverish energy, despite the fatigue. You see, even weakened, I couldn't stop painting. It was stronger than the illness.
Even weakened, I couldn't stop painting.
—Did you have famous friends? What did you do in the evenings?
In the evenings, I liked to go out and listen to music. I loved opera and concerts. My dearest friend was a musician, Frédéric Chopin. When he played the piano just for me, in a drawing room, it was… as if color became sound. I also frequented the writer George Sand. We would talk about art late into the night. Then, back home, before sleeping, I would open my Journal and write down my thoughts of the day. Painting and music, you see, are two sisters. Both seek to touch your heart without needing words.
—What is the last great painting you are most proud of?
Toward the end, I painted directly on the walls of a church, Saint-Sulpice, very close to my home. In a small chapel, I depicted Jacob Wrestling with the Angel. It's the story of a man who fights all night against an angel, never giving up. Can you guess why that subject touched me so much? I too had struggled all my life — against illness, against critics, to defend my way of painting. This work is a bit like my farewell, my testament. I put into it all my remaining strength, and everything I had learned about movement and color.
This imaginary interview was generated by artificial intelligence from sources documented in Eugène Delacroix's profile. It dramatises what the figure might have said based on what we know about them, but does not constitute attested historical testimony. For primary sources and factual documentation, refer to the full profile.