François Rude

François Rude was born on 4 January 1784 in Dijon, on a street later renamed in his honor. His father, a blacksmith and locksmith, trained him in metalworking so he could inherit the family trade. Despite his father’s objections, Rude began studying at the School of Fine Arts in Dijon in 1799, while still working in the family shop.

His teacher, Louis Fremiet, was the deputy curator of the Dijon museum. Rude studied drawing and sculpture using classical models. Fremiet helped keep him out of Napoleon’s army and, in 1808, sent him to Paris.

In Paris, Rude entered the Imperial École des Beaux-Arts in August 1808, studying under Pierre Cartellier, a classicist. His classmates included future prominent sculptors David d’Angers, James Pradier, and Antoine-Louis Barye. He gained practical experience as an assistant to Edme Gaulle, who was working on the sculptural frieze for the column at Place Vendôme celebrating Napoleon’s victories.

In 1809, he took second place in the academy’s annual competition with Marius meditating upon the ruins of Carthage. In 1812, he won two competitions: one for a bust called attention combined with fear, and another for Aristotle deploring the loss of his bees. The latter won the Prix de Rome, but the French Academy in Rome was short of funds, so his departure was delayed.

He was preparing to leave again in early 1815 when Napoleon returned from Elba. After Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo and the second Bourbon restoration, Rude went into self-imposed exile in Brussels. At Fremiet’s request, he took along Fremiet’s mother-in-law, aunt, and two daughters, including Sophie, whom he married in 1821.

Exile in Brussels

Rude lived in Brussels from 1817 to 1826, among other exiles such as the painter Jacques-Louis David. Sophie became David’s pupil and copyist. Rude made a bust of David that was neoclassical in style but realistically showed the deformation of David’s mouth from a nervous condition. His first major commission came from the Belgian royal architect Charles Vander Straeten: decorative reliefs for the hunting lodge of the crown prince at Tervuren.

The work included a frieze for the Hall of Honor’s rotunda, with a classical hunting scene, The Hunt of Meleager, and eight reliefs depicting the life of Achilles. Sophie also worked on the frieze. Rude based his designs on classical models but gave them naturalism and dynamism.