''The Woman with Gambling Mania'' (French: ''La Folle Monomane du jeu'') is an 1822 painting by
Théodore Géricault
Jean-Louis André Théodore Géricault (; 26 September 1791 – 26 January 1824) was a French Painting, painter and Lithography, lithographer, whose best-known painting is ''The Raft of the Medusa''. Although he died young, he was one of the pi ...
. It is a member of a series of ten portraits of people with specific manias done by Géricault between 1820 and 1824, including ''
Portrait of a Kleptomaniac
''Portrait of a Kleptomaniac'' or ''Portrait of an Insane Person'' ( or ) is an 1822 oil painting by Théodore Géricault. It is part of series of ten portraits made for the psychiatrist Étienne-Jean Georget and is currently kept in the Museum ...
'' and ''
Insane Woman
''Insane Woman'' is an 1822 oil on canvas painting by Théodore Géricault in a series of work Géricault did on the mentally ill. It is housed in the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon
The Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon (french: Musée des Beaux-Arts ...
''.
Following the controversy surrounding his ''
The Raft of the Medusa
''The Raft of the Medusa'' (french: Le Radeau de la Méduse ) – originally titled ''Scène de Naufrage'' (''Shipwreck Scene'') – is an oil painting of 1818–19 by the French Romantic painter and lithographer Théodore Géricault (1791†...
'', Géricault fell into a depression. In return for help by psychiatrist
Étienne-Jean Georget
Étienne-Jean Georget (2 April 1795 – 14 May 1828) was a French psychiatrist. He is known for writing on monomania. He is also the pioneer of forensic psychiatry, and was the first psychiatrist to discuss the defence of insanity to criminal ch ...
, Géricault offered him a series of paintings of mental patients, including this one, in a time when the scientific world was curious about the minds of the mentally insane. A solid example of
romanticism
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...
, Géricault's portrait of a mental asylum patient attempts to show a specific form of insanity through facial expression.
This painting was acquired by
the Louvre in 1938.
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References
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Woman with a Gambling Mania
1822 paintings
Paintings by Théodore Géricault
Paintings in the Louvre by French artists
French gamblers
Gambling in art