Diogenes

Painted in 1620 during the artist's developing years, this work by Georges de La Tour demonstrates the vitality of seventeenth-century French painting during the height of the Baroque era. Georges de La Tour approaches the subject with distinctive artistic vision, producing a work of both technical accomplishment and expressive power. Characteristic of the artist's mature approach, the work displays extreme tenebrism using a single candle or flame as the sole light source, simplification of forms to near-geometric purity, silent contemplative mood, elimination of all extraneous narrative detail.

Executed with skilled technique and attention to careful observation, the work reveals Georges de La Tour's characteristic approach to composition and surface. The treatment of light and the careful modulation of color create visual richness within a unified pictorial scheme.