Jean-Baptiste Madou | Genre painter

Jean-Baptiste Madou (1796-1877) was a Belgian painter and lithographer.

He created the Société Royale Belge des Aquarellistes.

Madou was born in Brussels.

He studied at the Brussels Academy of Fine Arts and was a pupil of Pierre Joseph Célestin François.

While draftsman to the topographical military division at Kortrijk, he received a commission for lithographic work from a Brussels publisher.

It was about 1820 that he began his artistic career.

Between 1825 and 1827 he contributed to Les Vues pittoresques de la Belgique, to a Life of Napoleon, and to works on the costumes of the Netherlands, and later made a great reputation by his work in La Physionomie de la société en Europe depuis 1400 jusqu'à nos jours (1836) and Les Scenes de la vie des peintres.

It was not until about 1840 that Madou began to paint in oils, and the success of his early efforts in this medium resulted in a long series of pictures representing scenes of village and city life, including The Fiddler, The Jewel Merchant, The Police Court, The Drunkard, The Ill-regulated Household, and The Village Politicians.

Among his numerous works mention may also be made of The Feast at the Chateau (1851), The Unwelcome Guests (1852, Brussels Gallery), generally regarded as his masterpiece, The Rat Hunt (acquired by Leopold II, king of the Belgians), The Arquebusier (1860) and The Stirrup Cup.

At the age of sixty-eight he decorated a hall in his house with a series of large paintings representing scenes from La Fontaine's fables, and ten years later made for King Leopold a series of decorative paintings for the Château de Ciergnon.

Madou died in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode on 31 March 1877 and was buried in the local cemetery. | Source: © Wikipedia

Jean-Baptiste Madou è stato un pittore, illustratore, litografo ed incisore Belga.

Era una figura popolare, ricordata principalmente come un pioniere della litografia ed uno dei migliori pittori di genere dell'epoca.

Pittore ed incisore, nato a Bruxelles il 3 febbraio 1796, ivi morto il 3 aprile 1877.

Allievo dell'Accademia di Bruxelles e di Pierre Joseph Célestin François (1759-1851), dal 1819 in poi lavorò a Mons godendo di molta voga come pittore della gioia sana e bonaria, quale D. Teniers era stato prima di lui.

Indulgendo al gusto del tempo fece anche lui pittura storica, ma semplice e familiare.

Scherzoso talvolta, ma mai sconveniente nelle scene di genere; più brioso e vivace di altri artisti contemporanei, di F. de Braekeleer, p. es., rimane come questi semplice e discreto tra l'arte pomposa allora fiorente.

Come nel Teniers, il colore delle sue opere è fresco.

Sue pitture decorative sono nel castello reale di Ciergnon (Dinant) quadri nel museo di Bruxelles e di Anversa, ecc. | © Treccani, Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana