# 1788 in art

Events from the year 1788 in art.

## Events

* Étienne Maurice Falconet becomes director of the Académie des beaux-arts.

## Works

* Thomas Barrett – Charlotte Medal
* James Barry – King Lear Weeping over the Dead Body of Cordelia (1786–88)
* Jacques-Louis David – Portrait of Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier and his Wife
* Marguerite Gérard – First Steps (approximate date)
* Girodet – The Death of Tatius
* Francisco Goya
** Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga ("Red Boy", 1787–88)
** The Meadow of San Isidro
** St. Francis of Borja Attending a Dying Man
* Anton Graff – Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin
* Thomas Lawrence – Portrait of William Linley
* Guillaume Guillon-Lethière - Brutus Condemning His Sons to Death
* Philip James de Loutherbourg –The Falls of the Rhine at Schaffhausen
* Sir Joshua Reynolds
** The Age of Innocence (probable date)
** Lord Heathfield
** Portrait of Maria Fitzherbert
* Johann Zoffany – Colonel Mordaunt's Cock Match

## Births

* February 5 – Sarah Goodridge, American painter who specialized in miniatures (died 1853)
* February 24 – Johan Christian Dahl, Norwegian landscape painter (died 1857)
* February 29 – Catharine Hermine Kølle, Norwegian adventurer and painter (died 1859)
* March 12 – Pierre Jean David, sculptor and engraver ("David d'Angers") (died 1856)
* April 5 – Franz Pforr, painter (died 1812)
* April 18 – Charles de Steuben, French painter active during the Napoleonic Era (died 1856)
* April 20 – Emma Körner, German painter (died 1815)
* April 24 – Ammi Phillips, American painter (died 1865)
* June 18 - Ernesta Legnani Bisi, Italian painter and engraver (died 1859)
* September 8 – William Collins, English landscape and genre painter (died 1847)
* August 6 – Felix Slade, founder of the Slade School of Art (died 1868)
* November 4 – Jacques-Édouard Gatteaux, French sculptor and medal engraver (died 1881)
* November 28 – Kikuchi Yōsai – Japanese painter most famous for his monochrome portraits of historical figures (died 1878)
* date unknown
** Michele Bisi, Italian engraver and painter (date of death unknown)
** Albertus Jonas Brandt, Dutch still-life painter (died 1821)
** Martin Cregan, Irish portrait painter (died 1870)
** John Watson Gordon, painter (died 1864)
** Michael Hanhart, British lithographer and chromolithographer (died 1865)
** Mary Harrison, English flower and fruit painter, and illustrator (died 1875)
** Emma Eleonora Kendrick, British miniature painter (died 1871)
** Paolo Toschi, Italian draughtsman and engraver (died 1854)
** William Edward West, American portrait painter (died 1859)

## Deaths

* February 13 – Josef Jáchym Redelmayer, Czech painter, fresco painter and theater decorator (born 1727)
* February 17 – Maurice Quentin de La Tour, French Rococo portraitist who worked primarily with pastels (born 1704)
* March 2 – Solomon Gessner, Swiss painter and poet (born 1730)
* May 29 – Jacques Aliamet, French engraver (born 1726)
* July 15 – Jean Germain Drouais, French historical painter (born 1763)
* August 2 – Thomas Gainsborough, English portrait painter (born 1727)
* September 27 – Sir Robert Taylor, stonemason, sculptor, and architect (born 1714)
* September 30 – Matthäus Günther, German painter and artist of the Baroque and Rococo era (born 1705)
* December 30 – Francesco Zuccarelli, Italian Rococo painter, elected in 1763 to the Venetian Academy of Fine Arts (born 1702)
* date unknown
** Fabio Berardi, Italian engraver (born 1728)
** Joseph Bergler the Elder, Austrian sculptor (born 1718)
** Carlo Bonavia, Italian veduta painter (date of birth unknown)
** Gaspard Duché de Vancy, French painter and drawer (born 1756)
** George Farington, English artist (born 1752)
** Toriyama Sekien, scholar and ukiyo-e artist of Japanese folklore (born 1712)
** François-Gaspard Teuné, French ébéniste (cabinet-maker) (born 1726)
** Min Zhen, Chinese painter and seal carver born in Nanchang in Jiangxi (born 1730)