Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot - famous french artist. Known as a great landscape painter of the Romantic era. He paid special attention to Valera. Valer - shades of color that are achieved using a certain technique and create the effect of the depth and nature of the light and air environment. The special technique of painting landscapes, in which more emphasis is placed on the subtle tones of the atmosphere and air, had a great influence on the Impressionists.
Born July 17, 1796 in Paris. It is known that he received his first painting lessons from the artist Michalon and Bertin. Corot art researchers note that Jean Baptiste paid special attention to the painting of such artists as Canaletto, Guardi and Lorrain, some features of their painting are also visible in the painting of Camille Corot. However, the art of this French artist is original and unique in its own way. He had his own style, which made him truly famous for many centuries. Many of Corot's paintings, both landscapes and portraits, convey the autumn mood with hints of sadness and philosophical silence, peace.
The landscape painter Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot often traveled the world, where he drew inspiration and found beautiful views for his work. He often visited Italy, Switzerland, traveled a lot in France, and also traveled to such countries as Belgium, England, the Netherlands. Most of Corot's paintings are landscapes. In addition to landscapes, he also became famous for his portraits. The most famous portraits of this author are "Woman in a pink skirt", "Interrupted reading", "Gypsy with a mandolin", "Lady in blue" and others.
During his life, Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot painted over 3,000 paintings and dozens of etchings. The great artist died on February 22, 1875 in France. Currently, his work is kept in such major museums as the Louvre in Paris, the Art Institute in Chicago, the Museum of Art in Sao Paulo, the Museum of Art in St. Louis, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art in Washington , Pushkin Museum im. A. Pushkin in Moscow, etc.
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Born in Paris on July 17, 1796, Corot was the son of a very wealthy clothing merchant. After studying at Rouen College, at the age of 26, he was given financial freedom to devote himself to painting.
He first studied under the landscape designer Achille Etna Michallon and after his death under Jean-Victor Bertin (1767-1842), both of whom were students of Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes. From 1825 to 1828 Korot made a trip to Italy, which is considered very significant for his formation as a landscape painter. Camille lived in Rome and Campagna before going to Naples. In 1827 he sent his first paintings to the Paris Salon: "View of Narni" (now in Ottawa, in the National Gallery of Canada) and "Roman Campagna" (now in Zurich, Kunsthaus Museum).
Later, Corot returned to Italy in 1834 and 1843. He also traveled extensively in France, visiting Normandy, Provence, the Morvan region of Burgundy, to which he returned later. In 1854 he traveled through Holland and Belgium, visited Switzerland regularly, and in 1862 lived for some time in London.
During these trips, Corot worked a lot in the open air and filled numerous notebooks with sketches and drawings. His early sketches, for example, painted in Italy, were very expressive and fresh, full of bright colors in strokes. During the winter months, he worked in the studio on ambitious mythological and religious landscapes intended for the salon. Hagar in the Desert (now in New York, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art), exhibited in the Salon of 1835, is characteristic of his early style and, like his open-air studies, has the clear forms and colors of academic painting.
His reputation developed by the 1850s, when his style became softer and his colors more subdued. In his late studio landscapes, which were often populated by bathers, Bakchans, and allegorical figures, he used a small range of colors, often using soft colored grays and blue-greens with occasional patches of color to highlight the figures' clothing.
Topographical details were suppressed in favor of mood and atmosphere, most notably in his "souvenirs" which were based on memories of actual landscapes. They were popular, and Corot was favorable to young artists who copied his paintings, either using them as teaching aids or making copies for sale. This later led to numerous forgeries and imitations, as well as attribution difficulties.
At the 1855 Exposition Universelle, Corot showed six paintings and won a gold medal. His influence on landscape painting in the 19th century, including the Impressionists, was significant. Especially numerous followers were influenced by his technique of depicting light on the landscape. However, for a long time, especially among collectors, the popularity of his later work overshadowed his earlier works.
The most dissimilar, the most unique, the most original - criticism has never skimped on enthusiastic epithets addressed to the French romanticist, who expanded the boundaries of the genre and introduced something into it that served as inspiration for the impressionists of the second half of the 19th century.
Corot became an artist "suddenly". Since childhood, this absent-minded and silent son of a wealthy merchant did not cause any special problems to his parents. He studied at a private boarding school, then was sent to Rouen, where he learned the basics of trading. He studied without pleasure, but managed in all subjects.
Already the first experience of working in a cloth merchant's shop was sad. Kamil did not know how to sell stale goods, and he gave new and high-quality goods at a big discount to anyone who asked him for this discount. The owner of the shop sent him to the family with a letter in which he regretfully informed the parent that his son was unfit for commerce. The father did not think to be upset, attributing all the failures of his offspring to youth and inexperience.
Camille's sudden announcement that he no longer wants to do business and wants to become an artist did not unsettle his father either. He was only glad that he would not spend more money on his son.
Several years as apprentices to well-known masters of painting taught the novice artist little. Much more he learned during a trip to. From the trip, Corot brings several sketches that have received good reviews from colleagues. After Italy, the artist travels around his native country, creating one masterpiece after another. With his fertility and the speed with which the master produced new paintings, the artist resembled the Dutch masters of the 17th century.
Corot's heritage is a whole gallery of portraits, several works on mythological and allegorical subjects and innumerable landscapes that have received the highest recognition in the art world.
The master believed that only what is written from nature the first time is the most sincere and talented. The etude nature of his canvases, some incompleteness, at first caused bewilderment, but soon the critics reconciled themselves to this. Along with incompleteness, in the works of Corot admired the ability to "grab" the main thing, avoid static and bring something more to the landscape. Playing on halftones, loving fogs, haze, fuzzy forms, the artist managed to bring into his romantic landscapes that sense of mobility and life itself, which inspired the Impressionists, who were concerned precisely with the transfer of the movement of the surrounding world, the first impressions of what they saw.
Corot was true to his manner to the end of his life. From 1827 until his death in 1875, the master did not miss a single exhibition at the Salon. Interestingly, his last works were presented to the public after his death. Dying in his Parisian apartment, Corot ordered several of his works to be exhibited at the next exhibition, even if he was no longer alive. At the exhibition of 1875, the most popular among the public were the works of the departed artist, a recognized master, unique and original, unlike others.
Koro's painting becomes more refined, quivering, light, rich in valery, the forms seem to dissolve in a silver-pearl haze. In an effort to capture the instantaneous, changeable states of nature, to preserve the freshness of the first impression, Corot in many ways anticipated the search for impressionist painters (“Hay Carriage”, State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow). When Ashil Etna Michalon returned from Rome in 1821, his pupil was Corot, the twenty-five-year-old son of the owner of a fashion studio in the Rue Bac in Paris, who was clearly aware of his future path in art.
By the end of 1825, Corot himself had already moved to Rome. It so happened that the main problem in landscape painting of the 19th century was a new technique, the discovery of which, at first glance, looked like a simple, albeit predictable accident. However, the “play of chance” was, with sufficient certainty, the result of an impartial process of painting technique, as well as an artist’s greater trust in purely visual experience than in the art of previous eras. The openness of this new original position of the landscape painter was based on the understanding that the color, form and lighting in the picture should be reproduced directly and only in their totality.
What was new in this process? A sketch painted in oil at a certain moment brings to our senses a visual image of existing physical matter; oil paint conveys everything softly and authentically, ideally contributing to the disclosure of the artist's individuality. Using primed paper, Corot learned to distribute tones from the lightest to the darkest through half a dozen successive gradations that convey the nuances of the actual lighting of everything visible. Like most plein air painters, Corot believed that only he himself could know the true value of his oil studies, and therefore jealously guarded the collection of his favorite studies, calling them pearls. Contrary to popular belief, not all of the best of them were early; Corot created magnificent studies in the open air almost until the end of his life. Nevertheless, “View of the Colosseum through the arcade of the Basilica of Constantine” is indeed one of the earliest studies, and no other can equal it in beauty. As is so often the case in landscapes from nature, there is a deep connection with tradition. The tripartite structure that unites the whole image so majestically is reminiscent of those Renaissance altarpieces that Corot knew well from the Louvre, such as the altar painting by Philippe Lippi, which preserved the tripartite division as an echo of Gothic triptychs.
Using such charming and natural models as in the painting “The Bride”, Corot was able to bring a lot of pretty simplicity to the painting. A later period of his work belongs to "Woman with Pearls" - the most perfect of his portraits. It again appears, as if from the depths, the knowledge of the Louvre collection, which has entered into flesh and blood. For all its delightful freshness, as is typical for the portrait images of Corot, the figure of a young woman adorned with pearls looks like an involuntary paraphrase of the portrait of “Monna Lisa”. It is significant that, meeting with her at the end of the Louvre exhibition, we are faced with a reminder of the legacy of the era of King Francis I.
Painting by Camille Corot “Ville d'Avre”.
Delicate pastel colors and fluffy trees create a drowsy, dewy early morning atmosphere in this wonderfully delicate landscape. The pale silvery sky is reflected in the lake, and the sun illuminating the houses on the left is reminiscent of the picturesque sketches painted by Corot in Italy. In 1817, Corot's father bought a country house in the vicinity of Paris, in Wild "Avre, where the painting was painted. Throughout his long creative life, Corot continued to paint views of this area. Corot was one of the greatest landscape painters of the 19th century. Corot also painted genre portraits , in which the model is organically included in the environment (“Woman with a Pearl”, 1868-1870, Louvre, Paris), large landscape compositions with plot-mythological motifs (“Bathing Diana”, 1873-1874, State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow) Corot is also known as a major draftsman, lithographer, etcher. Corot's art covers almost the entire century, many artists inspired him, he himself served as a source of inspiration for several generations. Corot's connection with the academic tradition and at the same time the immediacy and freshness of perception gave rise to call him “the last of the classical landscape painters and the first of the impressionists.” In fact, some features of later works Corot can be seen in the paintings of Alfred Sisley and Claude Monet. It is believed that during his long creative life, Corot painted about three thousand paintings. Camille Corot died on February 22, 1875 in Paris.
Works by Jean Baptiste Camille Corot are exhibited. His work combines classical, romantic and realistic features.
He died in 1875 and lived a long and fruitful life. Corot was familiar with the Barbizons, but did not share their views. In many ways, Camille Corot anticipated Impressionism, while remaining a classical artist. And although the Impressionists themselves called Corot their forerunner and teacher, he himself did not understand and did not accept their painting.
Corot's work came at a time when the public had already begun to like the Barbizons. It often happens that in the beginning people do not accept the new. Then, after some time, something else appears and what was not liked a few years ago already seems attractive, because a newer and uglier direction has appeared, as they usually talk about something unusual. When the Impressionists appear, whose “creativity” did not go into any gates at all, they already seem to have gotten used to the Barbizons and began to like them.
Camille Corot. “Portrait of Mariette Gambe (dreams of Mariette)”
In our exposition there is a portrait of the sister of the artist Camille Corot, painted by him. This painting is called “Portrait of Mariette Gambe (Dreams of Mariette)”, a work that bears little resemblance to a portrait, it is rather a genre painting, an image not of the girl herself, but of her daydreaming, thoughtfulness.
Camille Corot. “Morning in Venice”
Corot received an absolutely traditional art education, graduating from the Academy with a gold medal. And he, as an encouragement, is sent to improve in Italy for three years at public expense. From there he brought a small painting "Morning in Venice".
After these three years, returning to his homeland, Corot sets himself the goal of walking all over France and discovering the quivering of his native nature. And from every hiking trip he brought new paintings. One of his works“A hay cart (a wagon crossing a ford near a large tree)”.
Camille Corot. landscapes
Playing with light and shadow, Corot writes a kind of transitional state of nature. Obviously - it has recently rained or it is still raining. The wagon runs over a large puddle. It was raining, but it has already passed. Behind the tree, the lawn is already lit by the sun and it breaks through the clouds.
The transitional state of nature is shown with great skill.
Any landscape by Camille Corot is a mood landscape. He conveys trembling, mobility, vibration not only with compositional constructions, but also with stunning valor painting.
Any picture of Corot confirms that he was not the most prominent colorist. He believed that color in painting is not the most important thing. You need to first draw everything, and then show all the objects in motion. The movement of the master is manifested at the level of the fluttering of foliage, the breath of the wind, the rustle of grass. And he gave this movement not only with a vibrating stroke. Corot DID NOT PRESCRIBE DETAILS, like Guerin.
Corot claimed that in each color there are at least 20 of its gradations. But the task of the artist is not only to recognize these details, but also to superimpose them so that all shades from the darkest to the lightest are not repeated more than once in the picture.
Corot plays with any picture in such a way as to decompose the color into all shades and place each of them in the picture. First, he decomposes, say, the green color. Then he does the same with gray. And then he takes a certain contrasting color and applies it with dots in the picture so as to further enhance this quivering. He called this color sauce or seasoning.
Camille Corot. "Gust of wind"
For example, Corot's “sauce” in the painting “A Gust of Wind” is the color of a woman's scarf, which is played up with highlights in the sky. The color scheme of the picture is almost monochrome and this handkerchief is the only yellowish spot.
DRAWING is always noticeable in Corot's works. Pay attention to his so-called "fluffy" style of writing. The figures in the picture are needed to create depth, the third dimension. It is important that Corot for the first time manages to convey with the help of painting a certain “awe of the atmosphere”. On this canvas, you can physically feel the wind, the movement of the atmosphere, and how the peasant woman hardly walks towards its impulses. The movement in the picture, like the excitement in nature, is unclear, not fully expressed by the artist - this is only a slight trembling, but not a storm, not the dramatic nature of the elements that captivated.
Camille Corot. "Bathing Diana"
“The Bathing of Diana” is one of the last (almost the very last) works of Corot.
Some experts argue that the latter. At this time, Corot is denied participation in exhibitions, stating that the time has come for young authors, and everyone is tired of his manner of writing. And somehow he was advised to refresh the subject a little, to paint some kind of Venus in a landscape. 75-year-old Corot was inspired, took out a large canvas, invited the daughter of Charles Francois Daubigny Emma, and depicted her against the backdrop of nature, like Diana.
But how he writes his Diana. Keeping in mind the traditions of classicism in art, he corrects her figure, turning it into a beautiful antique statue. Corot was far from the traditions of impressionism. His landscape is painted in one lighting mode, and Emma in another, she is consecrated by light from a completely different source. Her figure does not fully connect with the background; she seems to be “inserted” into the landscape. Later, the Impressionists will notice that a pictorial object cannot exist in isolation, all objects must be united by light. But Corot will not live to see this.
The girl on this canvas is frankly sorry. She is standing in a puddle, I really want to cover her with a blanket, wrap her up so that she does not freeze. The picture is distinguished by a very clear and correct FIGURE! Koro has always done this.
As for the plot - an illustration of a famous episode from the myth. Diana entered the lake to swim and suddenly saw the reflection of the hunter Actaeon in the water. She was horrified that he saw her naked, turned him into a deer and the dogs instantly tore the unfortunate one. That is, Corot follows in the footsteps - he inserts a mythological plot into the landscape.
Interestingly, Corot wrote this work at the same time as Renoir's Nude. But Renoir will be doused with mud, and Corot will be erected on a pedestal, if not on the sky.
Camille Corot at the Pushkin Museum
Our collection contains 14 works by Corot. Two of them are questionable. And if you do not talk about these two, then the remaining 12 are of the highest quality. (You can still talk for a long time about the many fakes of Corot.
The end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries was the time when American salesmen hurried to Europe for paintings and other antiques. The New World did not create its own art, was busy making money, they bought art in Europe, they spared no money. And if there is a demand, then immediately there is a supply of ... fake paintings. Corot falls under this demand, his paintings are very popular with Americans. Well, an incredible number of fakes under “Coro” were created. There is an art and antique joke that out of 2,000 of his paintings, 4,000 are kept in private collections. But in our museum, Corot's works are GENUINE!)
Another master who did not belong to the Barbizons, but was associated with their school, is Jean-Francois Millet (1814-1875). He became one of the greatest masters of the middle of the 19th century. He received his first recognition thanks to portraits and small paintings on biblical themes. But the main motive of his works was peasant labor.
Born in Normandy in a peasant environment, the artist focused not on the genre of landscape, but on the depiction of peasant labor, the main, in his opinion, the purpose of man on earth. Millet showed rural labor as the natural state of man, as the only possible form of his being.
The artist was a friend of Theodore Rousseau, unlike the Barbizons, he himself did not come to Barbizon, but lived there permanently. Since he himself was a peasant, he saw nature as the sphere of peasant labor and considered it his task to convey the connection of the peasant with nature. His landscapes are covered with the presence of man, filled with echoes of his thoughts and dreams. In the landscape theme of Millet, the theme of labor in the biblical sense appears - labor, like peasant humility, in order to get bread in the sweat of one's brow. This theme will be further appreciated and borrowed by Vincent van Gogh.
Jean Francois Millet. "Faggot Collectors"
“Faggot Gatherers” (1850s) is a plot of difficult peasant work, characteristic of the artist. There is no sky in the picture the point of view is given from above and this evokes a feeling of oppressive heaviness, intense effort concentrated in human figures. It seems that this space is falling down, pressing the heroes to the ground.
Another theme, besides the connection between nature and man, peasant work, is the theme of labor that disfigures a person. He writes his heroines from such a point of view that we will never consider them, their faces are not visible. But the crooked legs of the brushwood collectors rhyme with twisted branches. This is their close connection with this world. They are as clumsy, as simple as this world.
The whole picture is dominated by earthy-brown tones, with which the clothes of peasant women are written. Shadows thicken under the trees, shatter in the brushwood heap in the foreground. Millais was a poor colorist. But he has strokes that make the space of this painting more dynamic. Van Gogh uses this manner of Millet and takes it to the limit, to the extreme.
Jean Francois Millet. "Hacks"
Another painting by Millet in the collection of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts is called Haystacks.
The work of Jean-Francois Millet clearly manifested the features of democratic realism - an advanced movement in French art in the mid-19th century. The head of democratic realism was
