Théodore Chassériau (1819–1856) – A Bridge Between Classical Grace and Romantic Passion Théodore Chassériau (born Sept. 20, 1819, Santa Barbará de Samaná, Saint-Domingue—died Oct. 8, 1856, Paris) was a French painter who attained some measure of success in his attempt to fuse the Neoclassical art of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and the Romanticism of Eugène Delacroix. As a boy, Chassériau entered the studio of Ingres, following his master to Rome in 1834. Chassériau’s immediate success at the Paris Salon of 1836 was confirmed three years later by a Venus and his “Suzanne,” both in the Louvr…