Georges de La Tour · 1593–1652
Georges de La Tour
Georges de La Tour (1593-1652) was a 17th-century French painter. He spent his life in Lorraine, painting quiet works with strong light-and-dark effects created by lamplight.
Georges de La Tour was born in Lorraine and worked there throughout his life. He used sharp realism and dramatic chiaroscuro. He began with genre scenes and the like, but gradually turned to producing spiritual religious works of a popular character.
He reduced figures to round, geometric forms and staged psychological states through the light and dark created by intense lamplight. In this way he established pictures both monumental and still, and he is valued as a leading painter of 17th-century French classicism. In Japan, Man Smoking a Pipe is held.
Continuing to work in his native Lorraine is also a feature of his career. Georges de La Tour was born on March 13, 1593 and died on January 30, 1652.
