The Death of Socrates is a history painting by the French artist Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825) that was made in 1787. This painting is one of the great works of Neoclassicism the art genre of the Enlightenment that looked back to the classical world.
This painting takes us to Ancient Greece and the last moments of the great philosopher Socrates. He is in a dark dungeon, surrounded by his followers and about to take the cup of poison. All about him men are stricken with grief while he alone is calm. The one who hands him the cup can't even bear to look at Socrates.
It is not just a man that dies in this artwork but reason itself. It wants us to feel sad at this loss of light, yet comforted by the knowledge that history will remember Socrates and not his judges. It is wrath of the intelligent against an unjust system.
It is also prescient in how it predicts the French Revolution's descent into madness. A movement that started with the best of intentions but ended up being more bloody than the ancien régime that came before it. A time when reason truly died.
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