¶ … post-revolutionary French art, and are titled; Nudity a La Grecque in 1799 and Colonization Gross's Plague-Stricken Jaffa share some fundamental commonalities. The similarities that these two articles share are their methodology, formal artistic analysis and their account and implicit description of the relationship between art and social history. Both of these articles also provide historical accounts of artistic criticism of post-Revolutionary history painting. Most significantly Grisby's articles provide a view of post-Revolutionary France where art, history and politics all combine to allow readers to more fully understand cultural and social issues of great importance of the time. Darcy Grimaldo Grisby sets out to dispel commonly held notions and opinions regarding Gross's Plague-Stricken Jaffa. The most significant theory he seeks to dispel is one that claims the painting is simply a government commissioned propaganda piece created to enlarge the image of the then, soon to be emperor of France Napoleon Bonaparte in the eyes of a concerned and wary post-Revolutionary France. Grisby argues and that there is a lot more depth and complexity in painting. She contends that there are a lot of significant and important elements at play. According to Grisby the elements she describes, which are element present in the artistic depiction of this historical event have connotations that are intended to created a new interpretive Iconography based on new founded French nationalistic values. The depiction of the Arabs helping...

Previously Arabs had been depicted in a manner that portrayed them as rude or savage even hedonistic. Grisby carefully describes how the Arabs are depicted in a favorable and gentle light, one that does not contrast Napoleon's gentle and heroic image, but one that accents it. Grisby also concentrates on the way that Napoleon is presented in a well dressed, controlled and harmonious manner. Not one that does not appears heroic according to the values of antiquity and classicism. She explains that there are several connotations that can be derived from Napoleon's image and these are apparently associated with a rationality and pragmatics. Napoleon is shown touching the wound or laceration of a victim of the bubonic plague in order to put to rest the notion that the plague was contagious. By relating this historically verified account of Napoleon's brave and rational actions, Grisby claims that David is helping to create a new form of Iconography that benefits nationalistic France, but one that is not a shallow dull attempt at propaganda. In order to support her theory she supports her thesis with arguments that are fortified with primary sources, which are contemporary of the time period, formal artistic analysis is also used, and scholarly secondary sources are also employed by Grisby. First hand historical accounts of the French military campaign into Egypt are used as evidence to support her theories regarding the significance and symbolic meanings of the paintings. For Example Grisby uses…