Jean-Paul Rabaut Saint-Étienne

This sketch focuses our attention on the gleaming eyes and animated expression of an important figure in the French Revolution. Jean-Paul Rabaut Saint-Étienne (1743-1793) was a Protestant preacher in Southern France who became instrumental in securing religious freedom for Protestants and Jews. This portrait sketch is one of several David made for an unrealized painting, The Oath of the Tennis Court, with which he intended to commemorate the historic meeting of representatives of the Estates General at Versailles, one of the inaugural events of the Revolution. The careful profile rendering of Rabaut Saint-Étienne’s features reveals his rapt attention to his political oath.