Attempting to make sense of the oeuvre of Prud’hon in 1876, Edmond de Goncourt in his Catalogue Raisonné de Prud’hon contrasts Prud’hon’s paintings with the predominant art of David and his students. He describes Prud’hon as an isolated romantic artist, full of elegance, going against the virile masculine academic traditions of his day. Goncourt sees in Prud’hon the epitome of an erotic classicism, which he considers unique for his time. I seek to demonstrate that Prud’hon’s embrace of classicism reflects and propels a variety of contexts from the literary, aesthetic, philosophical, and cultural developments of his time. The significance of poignant upheaval and the political change from the ancien regime through the Revolution and the Empire had a considerable impact on the various moments examined in my dissertation. I use selected examples from his works and those of his contemporaries to serve as case studies to reveal key moments in the development of his oeuvre. Prud’hon’s oeuvre is vast, but my dissertation will highlight case studies from 1770-1815. I have analyzed central concepts of this period’s aesthetic and philosophical ideals, especially the philosophic treatises by French Enlightenment thinkers such as Rousseau and Diderot, and by classicists like Winckelmann and Quatremère de Quincy. Prud’hon’s transformations were also clearly impacted by the historical reality of the French Revolution and Empire.

La notion de juridiction gracieuse est traditionnellement rattachée à l’activité du juge civil. Le juge administratif connaît pourtant d’une activité gracieuse a côté de son activité contentieuse. Entendue comme l’activité du juge en dehors de tout litige, elle est peu étudiée en droit administratif, mais largement analysée en droit judiciaire privé. Il pourtant est intéressant de comparer la manière dont les juges envisagent leur office dans le cadre gracieux, et d’approfondir les points communs et les divergences entre les deux régimes juridiques. Le développement d’une telle activité peut cependant apparaître paradoxal à l’heure où les tribunaux sont toujours plus engorgés et l’attrait pour les modes alternatifs de règlement des litiges, toujours plus développé. La progression de l’activité d’homologation de certains actes administratifs et notamment des transactions peut cependant permettre d’éviter la longueur d’un procès. Cette nouvelle procédure peut ainsi favoriser le renouvellement du principe de sécurité juridique et d’envisager sous un nouvel angle la définition de la fonction juridictionnelle du juge administratif. / The notion of non-contentious jurisdiction is traditionally connected to the activity of the civil judge. Still, the administrative judge administers contentious as well as non-contentious justice. Understood as the activity of the judge outside of any litigation, it is little studied in administrative law but widely examined in private judiciary law. Nevertheless, it is interesting to compare the way judges consider their office in a non-contentious frame as well as analyse further the common points and the differences between the two juridical regimes. However, the development of such an activity can appear paradoxical when courts keep being more and more congested and when the attraction for alternative ways of settling disputes keeps developing. Yet, the progression of the certification activity of some administrative acts, including transactions, can make it possible to avoid the length of a trial. This new procedure can thus favor the renewal of the principle of juridical security and makes it possible to consider from a new point of view the definition of the jurisdictional function of the administrative judge.