The Battle of Valmy

The Battle of Valmy, 1792 - by Horace Vernet The Battle of Valmy (20 September 1792) was the climax of the French Revolutionary Wars. Vernet captures the majesty of the event by avoiding a hero figure, instead producing a panorama of soldiers, cavalry, artillery and dead horses. The battlefield opens out in front of the composition, enabling the viewer to witness several stages of the fight simultaneously. To the left is an old wooden windmill, a feature that dominates the landscape and which formed a prominent focal point for the French command. Across the middle distance are lines of men, with mounted officers and horses in the foreground. Some men seem to be organizing the troops or listening to reports, and some are tending wounded men. Dead horses and dead soldiers show us that the victory was paid for in human lives. Off in the distance black smoke billows from cannons and spreads out across the landscape below the grey, overcast sky. The bleak clouds contrast against the brighter ground to help structure the composition. Vernet employs subdued greens, browns, greys and dark blues, interrupted by the vivid costumes of the military and the grey smoke of the cannons. The vast breadth of the canvas contributes to the sense of scale, giving the impression that the fighting continues for miles into the distance while the detailed rendering of attire, horses, weapons and gestures helps to draw us into the action. What is most intriguing about the painting is the way in which Vernet has merged the grandness of a battle with the miniature scale of human tragedies. The battle has not been depicted as a conflict between two armies – rather, it has been portrayed as a complex event with movement, chaos, command, injury, and everyone working together. Vernet has turned a historical military conflict into a spectacle that allows viewers to observe both the organisation of combat and its consequen