Henri Félix Emmanuel Philippoteaux (1815–1884) was a French

French people

The French are a nation that share a common French culture and speak the French language as a mother tongue. Historically, the French population are descended from peoples of Celtic, Latin and Germanic origin, and are today a mixture of several ethnic groups...

 artist

Artist

An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...

. He was born in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, studied art at the studio

Studio

A studio is an artist's or worker's workroom, or the catchall term for an artist and his or her employees who work within that studio. This can be for the purpose of architecture, painting, pottery , sculpture, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, radio or television...

 of Leon Cogniet

Léon Cogniet

Léon Cogniet was a French historical and portrait painter.- Biography :Cogniet was born in Paris. In 1812, he entered the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he studied under Pierre-Narcisse Guérin at the same time as Delacroix and Géricault. In 1817 he won the Prix de Rome and was a resident at...

, and first exhibited his work at the Paris Salon

Paris Salon

The Salon , or rarely Paris Salon , beginning in 1725 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Between 1748–1890 it was the greatest annual or biannual art event in the Western world...

 of 1833.

One of his most well-known works was a depiction of the Siege of Paris

Siege of Paris

The Siege of Paris, lasting from September 19, 1870 – January 28, 1871, and the consequent capture of the city by Prussian forces led to French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War and the establishment of the German Empire as well as the Paris Commune....

 during the Franco-Prussian War

Franco-Prussian War

The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...

, painted in the form of a cyclorama

Cyclorama

For the classical album Cyclorama, see Jonathan Goldstein; For the rock album Cyclorama by Styx, see Cyclorama ; for the theatrical backdrop, see Cyclorama...

, a type of large panoramic painting

Panoramic painting

Panoramic paintings are massive artworks that reveal a wide, all-encompassing view of a particular subject, often a landscape, military battle, or historical event. They became especially popular in the 19th Century in Europe and the United States, inciting opposition from writers of Romantic poetry...

 on the inside of a cylindrical platform designed to provide a viewer standing in the middle of the cylinder with a 360° view of the painting. Viewers surrounded by the panoramic image are meant to feel as if they are standing in the midst of a historic event or famous place.

Philippoteaux also produced a large number of works chronicling the rise and successes of Napoleon Bonaparte, including a portrait of Napoleon in his regimental uniform and a group of paintings of French victories in the Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...

. Philippoteaux was awarded the Légion d'honneur

Légion d'honneur

The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...

 in 1846.

Philippoteaux's son Paul Philippoteaux

Paul Philippoteaux

Paul Philippoteaux was a French artist. He is best known for a cyclorama of the Battle of Gettysburg.-Life and career:Paul Philippoteaux was born in Paris, the son of the French artist Henri Emmanuel Felix Philippoteaux...

 was also an artist; both were famous for their production of cyclorama

Cyclorama

For the classical album Cyclorama, see Jonathan Goldstein; For the rock album Cyclorama by Styx, see Cyclorama ; for the theatrical backdrop, see Cyclorama...

s. Father and son collaborated on The Defence of the Fort d'Issy in 1871. They also collaborated on a cyclorama of the Battle of Gettysburg

Gettysburg Cyclorama

The Battle of Gettysburg, also known as the Gettysburg Cyclorama, is a cyclorama painting by the French artist Paul Philippoteaux depicting "Pickett's Charge", the climactic Confederate attack on the Union forces during the Battle of Gettysburg on July 3, 1863...

 that became a celebrated work in the United States:

"One cyclorama, however, halted the slide in popularity, and almost single-handedly revived the public's interest in the medium for another decade...this singular creation was initially painted in 1882-83 by Henry F. Philippoteaux and Paul Philippoteaux, a father and son team of French artists...within a year, half a million people had stood before it."

Father and son enhanced the artistic effect of their cylindrical painting by adding a third dimension, including elements of diorama

Diorama

The word diorama can either refer to a nineteenth century mobile theatre device, or, in modern usage, a three-dimensional full-size or miniature model, sometimes enclosed in a glass showcase for a museum...

 placed in front of the painting, and by incorporating sections of walls and battlefield objects that blended into the painted parts of the presentation.

He died in 1884 and his obituary

Obituary

An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...

 in the New York Times appeared on November 10, 1884.

Partial list of works

• The Iceberg, Episode of the Wars of America, (1833)
• The Retreat from Moscow, (1835)
• The Capture of Ypres. (1837)
• Death of Turenne
• The Siege of Antwerp in 1792
• Colonel Fr. Ponsonby rescued on the battlefield of Waterloo, by a French Officer
• They are in our House (1880)
• The Periwinkle
• The Deception
• The Blade of Grass
• The Return from the Dram-shop, (1853)
• The Battle of the Raab,
• The Passage of the Tagliamento
• The Siege of Antwerp in 1832

External links

• Gallery of Philippoteaux works at New York Public Library
• Philippoteaux's The Siege of Paris cyclorama
• Panorama of the Defence of Paris, 1875 work at google books
• Partial list of his oil paintings