Nicolas Poussin

Life and work

Poussin's early biographer Giovanni Pietro Bellori related that he received an education including some Latin.^[2] Around 1612, at age eighteen, he ran away to Paris because his parents opposed a painting career for him.^[3] He arrived in Rome in the spring of 1624 and studied the art of painting nudes at the Academy of Domenichino.^[3][4] In 1627 he painted The Death of Germanicus for Cardinal Barberini, which established his reputation as a major artist.^[5]

He returned permanently to Rome in 1642 and settled there for the rest of his life.^[3] After brief periods in the studios of Ferdinand Elle and Georges Lallemand, he subsequently chose to labor at a very slow pace and in solitude.^[1][6] On 19 November 1665 he died in Rome, with his burial taking place at San Lorenzo in Lucina.^[3]

What the cited sources add

André Félibien, another early friend and biographer, reported that Poussin "was busy without cease filling his sketchbooks with an infinite number of different figures which only his imagination could produce"^[3] Félibien also published the first book devoted entirely to Poussin's work in 1647.^[3] Poussin's early sketches attracted the notice of Quentin Varin, and his later works showed Varin's influence in storytelling, accuracy of facial expression, finely painted drapery and rich colors.^[3] According to court records, Poussin accumulated substantial debts in Paris that he could not settle.^[6]