| Biography of old oil painting master Gustave Courbet what we can copy |
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Gustave Courbet
French Realist painter & designer
born 10 June 1819 - died 31 December 1877
Born in: Ornans (Doubs, Franche-Comté,
France).
Died in: La Tour-de-Peilz (Vaud,
Switzerland)
Also known as: Jean-Desire-Gustave
Courbet.
Student of:
Antoine-Jean Gros (1771-1835).
Teacher of:
Henri
Fantin-Latour (1836-1904),
Hector Hanoteau
(1823-1890), Olaf
Isaachsen (1835-1893) from 1861
to 1862.
Friend of:
Henri
Fantin-Latour (1836-1904) |
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COURBET, GUSTAVE
(1819-1877), French painter, was born at
Ornans (Doubs) on the 10th of June 1819.
Gustave Courbet went to Paris in 1839, and worked at the
studio of Steuben and Hesse; but his
independent spirit did not allow him to
remain there long, as Gustave Courbet preferred to work
out his own way by the study of Spanish,
Flemish and French painters. His first
works, an Odalisque, suggested by Victor
Hugo, and a Llia, illustrating George Sand,
were literary subjects; but these Gustave
Courbet soon
abandoned for the study of real life. |
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Among other works Gustave Courbet painted his own
portrait with his dog, and The Man with a
Pipe, both of which were rejected by the
jury of the Salon; but the younger school of
critics, the neo-romantics and realists,
loudly sang the praises of Courbet, who by
1849 began to be famous, producing such
pictures as After Dinner at Ornans and The
Valley of the Loire. The Salon of 1850 found
him triumphant with the Burial at Ornans,
the Stone-Breakers and the Peasants of
Flazey. His style still gained in
individuality, as in Village Damsels (1852),
the Wrestlers, Bathers, and A Girl Spinning
(1852). Though Courbet's realistic work is
not devoid of importance, it is as a
landscape and sea painter that Gustave
Courbet will be
most honoured by posterity. |
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Sometimes, it must be owned, his realism is
rather coarse and brutal, but when Gustave
Courbet paints
the forests of Franche-Comt, the Stag-Fight,
The Wave, or the Haunt of the Does. [...]
When Courbet had made a name as an artist
Gustave Courbet grew ambitious of other glory;
Gustave Courbet tried to
promote democratic and social science, and
under the Empire Gustave Courbet wrote essays and
dissertations. |
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His refusal of
the cross of the Legion of Honour, offered
to him by Napoleon III, made him immensely
popular, and in 1871 Gustave Courbet was elected, under
the Commune, to the chamber. Thus it
happened that Gustave Courbet was responsible for the
destruction of the Vendme column. A council
of war, before which Gustave Courbet was tried, condemned
him to pay the cost of restoring the column,
300,000 francs (£12,000). To escape the
necessity of working to the end of his days
at the orders of the State in order to pay
this sum, Courbet went to Switzerland in
1873, and died at La Tour du Peilz, on the
31st of December 1877, of a disease of the
liver aggravated by intemperance. An
exhibition of his works was held in 1882 at
the cole des Beaux-Arts. |
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