Tempera Batik Project - Georges Rouault

This painting looks like it could have been made using the Tempera Batik method.  In fact it is an oil painting, but the style is similar.  The painting is called ‘The Old King’ and was painted by Georges Rouaullt (a Fauvist/expressionist painter 1871-1958).  He shows the King in profile, in the same way that  kings and queens are shown on coins or stamps. This is part of a long and historical tradition going back to the time of the Romans and Greeks.  The bright colours with thick black outlines are also similar to stained glass window designs, something we looked at when viewing Van Gogh’s painting of his bedroom.  Van Gogh was influenced by the Japanese prints that were popular amongst artists in France at the time. It may be that Rouault was influenced by these images as well, but we know that he studied stained glass techniques and was taught by a Symbolist painter Gustave Moreau.  He was very ill for a period before making this painting, and his art became concerned with human suffering.  This particular painting was started during World War I, as the old monarchies in Europe were threatened, and he finished it during the economic depression leading up to World War II.