Fichier:Fran4.jpg

(b. 1819, Ornans, d. 1877, La Tour-de-Peilz)

Self-Portrait (Courbet with Black Dog) 1842 Oil on canvas, 27 x 23 cm Musée de Pontarlier, Pontarlier

Courbet's favourite subject in the 1840s seems to have been the self-portrait. This relatively unusual genre requires the artist to observe his own reflection, demanding remarkable stillness and concentration. Traveling to Belgium and the Netherlands for the first time in the summer of 1846, Courbet went to The Hague to admire the Rembrandt self-portraits. But unlike Rembrandt, Courbet liked to dress up and stage his own appearance. The series of self-portraits that Courbet painted between 1842 and 1849 is clearly Romantic in inspiration and the source of a very personal and modern interpretation of the myth of the artist in the nineteenth century.

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Author: COURBET, Gustave Title: Self-Portrait (Courbet with Black Dog) Time-line: 1851-1900 School: French Form: painting