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THE TEMPTATION IN THE WILDERNESS By BRITON RIVIERE

THE TEMPTATION IN THE WILDERNESS
By BRITON RIVIERE, R.A. (1840-1920)
IN THE GUILDHALL ART GALLERY, LONDON

The son of an artistic father, Briton Riviere gave early promise of distinction in the realm of art. At the age of eighteen he exhibited at the Royal Academy, and his pictures became an annual feature at Burlington House after his twenty-sixth year.

He was elected an A.R.A. in 1878, and was admitted to full membership in 1881. He is best known as a painter of wild animals, in which field he stands supreme. Even in this branch of art he has successfully introduced the religious element, as may be seen in his popular painting of "Daniel in the Lions' Den," in the Walker Art Gallery.

"The Temptation In the Wilderness" is an example of the artist's technical skill and knowledge, and is also interesting as being the successful outcome of an experiment in colour. The painter decided to express the sentiment of his subject almost entirely by means of colour, i.e. by the white figure of the Christ against the sunset glow of the sky, both sky and figure being focused by the gloom of the landscape. He made many notes of the colour effects derived from the juxtaposition of white and sunset, and found, as he expected and hoped, that the white, in shadow with the cold light of the south-eastern sky, appeared almost as a bright blue against the warm north-western sunset sky. This enabled him to dispense with the conventional nimbus of purely ecclesiastical pictures, and yet achieve an effect of the miraculous by showing, as if by accident, the white evening star, greatly magnified by the composition, just over the head of the Saviour.

From the book "Famous Paintings" Volume 2 printed in 1913.

Large files of this public domain print are available at Stock Photos at Songs of Praise
(Firefox users must click again on the large photo to see the very large image.)

Online "Name the Painting"

Biography of Briton Riviere
at Christ Centered Mall.com

Prints of Daniel Pictures by Riviere
Christ Centered Mall

Briton Riviere
at Illusions Gallery

"Daniel in the Lions' Den"
by Riviere

Famous Paintings in this Series

James Archer My Great Grandmother	Bashkirtseff The Meeting	Bouguereau Charity	John Brett From the Dorsetshire Cliffs
Arnesby Brown The River Bank	Joseph Clark Mother's Darling	John Constable The Hay-Wain	Jean Baptiste Camille Corot The Fisherman's Hut
Jean Baptiste Camille Corot A Flood	Leonardo Da Vinci Monna Lisa	Edouard Detaille The Dream	Henri Fantin-Latour Flowers
Thomas Gainsborough Queen Charlotte	Thomas Gainsborough The Market Cart	Jean Baptiste Greuze The Head of a Girl	Jean Baptiste Greuze Fidelity
James Clark Hook Home With the Tide	Alfred William Hunt Windsor Castle	Josef Israels The Shipwrecked Mariner	B.W. Leader The Stream in Summer-time
Madame Vigee Le Brun Portrait of the Artist	Alphonse Legros A Canal With a Fisherman	Anton Mauve Watering Horses	J.L.E. Meissonier The Cavalier
Sir J.E. Millais Speak! Speak!	Sir J.E. Mallais My First Sermon	George Morland The Reckoning	George Morland The Inside of a Stable
Murillo The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin	Alfred Parsons When Nature Painted All Things Gay	Ralph Peacock The Sisters	Rembrandt Syndics of the Cloth Merchants' Guild
Guido Reni "Ecce Homo"	Sir Joshua Reynolds Portrait of Mrs. Richard Hoare With Her Infant Son	Briton Riviere The Temptation in the Wilderness	Dante Gabriel Rossetti Day Dreams
John Singer Sargent Miss Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth	Lady Stanley (Dorothy Tennant) His First Offence	Jan Steen Grace Before Meat	Marcus Stone On the Road from Waterloo to Paris
Constant Troyon Watering Cattle	H.S. Tuke "All Hands to the Pumps"	Velazquez King Philip IV. of Spain	S.E. Waller Sweethearts and Wives
Thomas Webster The Smile	Index Famous Paintings Volume 1 Art Gallery	Index Famous Paintings Volume 2 Art Gallery	Index Art Appreciation Lessons