BALLU, Théodore

French architect. He won the Prix de RomeGLOSSARYA scholarship, founded concurrently with the French Academy in Rome (1666), that enabled prize-winning students at the Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in Paris to spend a period (usually 4 years) in Rome at the state's expense. Prizes for architecture began to be awarded regularly in 1723, and prizes for engravers and musicians were added in the 19th century. The prizes were meant to perpetuate the academic tradition and during the 18th and 19th centuries winning the award was the traditional stepping stone to the highest honours for painters and sculptors. Many distinguished artists (as well as many nonentities) were Prix de Rome winners, notably David, Fragonard, and Ingres among painters and Clodion, Girardon, and Houdon among sculptors. The prizes are still awarded and the system has been adopted by other countries. in 1840. The young laureate then left Paris and boarded at the Académie de France a Rome. He lived there from 1841 to 1845 and studied the ruins of Antiquity.

Back in France, Théodore Ballu became an assistant to German-born architect Franz Christian Gau (1790-1853) on the Basilique Sainte-Clotilde construction site, then took charge after Gau's death in 1853. From then on, his career was much focused on his preference for religious buildings.

In 1860, he was named chief architect of Parisian buildings related to the religion. He then designed the Église de la Trinité (1861-67), the Saint-Esprit temple on Rue Roquépine, and the churches of Saint-Ambroise (1863-69) and Saint-Joseph (1866-75). He also directed the Saint-Jacques Tower restoration (1854-58) and the construction of the Saint-Denis church in Argenteuil (1866). From 1858 to 1863, Théodore Ballu designed and created the belfry of the Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois church.