Ferdinand Victor Eugène Delacroix 26th April, 1798 - 13th August, 1863

Delacroix is considered the leading artist in French Romanticism and heavily influenced both the impressionist and symbolist movements.

Although he drew his own inspiration from the Venetian Renaissance, his rough brush strokes and use of vivid colours steered him away from the classical Greek models and lead him to travel to North Africa, in search of the exotic.

Delacroix illustrated various works of William Shakespeare, the Scottish author Walter Scott and the German author Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

In the words of Baudelaire, "Delacroix was passionately in love with passion, but coldly determined to express passion as clearly as possible."