Oil Painting, 'The Execution of Major Davel', Swiss School, Lausanne, 1850s

An oil painting depicting the execution of the Vaudois patriot Jean-Daniel-Abraham Davel; Davel kneels on a platform before a crowd, as the executioner readies the sword.

Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend

Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend, 1868

Historical significance: Although the subject matter of this painting is related to Charles Gleyre's composition, the sketchy technique and spatial arrangement are quite different.
The present painting focuses on the theatrical composition enhanced by the grimacing faces depicted below the scaffold in the shadow.
Gleyre's composition had an instant success and was extensively reproduced while the event was even re-enacted publicly in various tableaux vivants. This painting may therefore have borrowed from these subsequent representations.
The importance of the subject matter in the history of the Vaudois canton and the city of Lausanne suggest that the anonymous artist was probably native of Lausanne and made this picture shortly after 1850.
The sketchy technique differs from the refined Neo-classical brushwork of Gleyre and is close here to the manner developed by the Realist painters.

History painting, i.e. depictions of non recurring events based on religious, classical, literary or allegorical sources, particularly developed in Italy during the Renaissance (15th-16th centuries). History painting could include religious themes, or depictions of momentous recent events, but the term was most frequently associated with Classical subject-matter. However a renewed impetus was given to religious subjects after the Council of Trent (1545-63), which stipulated new iconographical programmes. The development of art treatises, in which the compositional rules guiding the art of painting were discussed also notably, influenced the evolution of history painting. From around 1600 history painting's principal rivals: still-life, landscape and genre painting began to emerge as independent collectable genres. Furthermore, the Rococo taste for the ornamental in the early 18th century prioritised the decorative quality of history painting, so that subject matters became more entertaining than exemplary. There was a renewed interest in history painting during the Neo-Classical period after which the taste for such pictures faded towards the end of the 19th century when an innovative approach to the image was led by the Symbolists and was developed further by subsequent schools in the early 20th century.

This painting shows an important event for the history of the Vaudois canton and the city of Lausanne: the execution of Major Davel, who was instrumental in the liberation of the canton from its subjection to Bern. The most famous version of this subject was executed by Charles Gleyre (1806-1874) for the Museum of Lausanne and delivered in 1850 (formerly in Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne; destroyed in 1980). However Gleyre chose not to paint the execution itself but the moment just before. The present composition borrows the main figures of Gleyre's version: the two ministers on the right hand-side and the executioner on the right. This work combined a scene of execution, particularly popular in the 19th century, with a subject from the Swiss history, a much favoured thematic of the time in Switzerland.

1617-1869