Jules Breton Paintings

Jules Breton Paintings for Sale

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Jules Breton Biography

French Naturalist painter, author & poet
born 1 May 1827 - died 5 July 1906

Also known as: Jules Adolphe Aimé Louis Breton, Adolph Aime Louis
Member of: Institute of France (from 1886); Légion d'Honneur (from 1861).
Student at: Academy of Ghent (from 1843); College St. Bertin, Courrières.

As one of the primary academic artists of the nineteenth century, Jules Breton evolved a painting style that combined a realist selection of thematic material with an interest in creating figural types that reflected the idealism of the classical traditions. Jules Breton paintings were often regarded as containing poetic references and his compositions suggest a timeless world where the workers of the field symbolically were linked with literary elegies that evoked their best qualities. Although Jules Breton paintings were out of favor for a long period of time, and his compositions were often used as convenient examples of so-called "bad-painting" by supporters of the modernist camp who panned any style whose goal was to portray the trials of the human condition instead of being dedicated to destroying the defining characteristics of great traditional art. His celebration of human values of work, family, home and hearth did not fit into their nihilistic paradigm, despite his poignant and poetic themes painted with a compositional force and sophistication of technique that clearly places him amongst the greatest artists of his time. Jules Breton paintings have returned to public consciousness through recent exhibitions and an interest in collecting Jules Breton works by private patrons and museums. Jules Breton is an artist who has benefitted greatly from the long over due revisionist reappraisal of nineteenth century academic painting.

He received his first artistic training not far from Courrières at the College St. Bertin near St. Omer. Later (1842) Jules Breton met the painter Félix de Vigne (1806-1862) who was impressed by his youthful talent and persuaded his family to let him study art. In 1843, Breton left for Ghent (Belgium) where the painter continued to study art at the Academy of Fine Art with de Vigne, and an other teacher from the school, the painter Hendrik Van der Haert (1790-1846). Sometime later (1846), Jules Breton moved to Antwerp where he took lessons with Baron Gustaf Wappers; Jules Breton also spent much of his time copying the reproductions of Flemish masters. Trained as an academic artist, the painter was well aware of other artistic tendencies such as the role of genre painting. In 1847, he finally left for Paris where Jules Breton hoped to perfect his artistic training at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.

Once there he studied in the atelier of the genre painter Michel-Martin Drolling (1786- 1851). Jules Breton also met, and became friends, with several of the Realist artists (François Bonvin, 1817-1887 and Gustave Brion, 1824-1877) and his early entries at the Salon reflected not only their influence, but also his concerns for the poor brought to the fore by the events of the 1848 Revolution. Jules Breton paintings Misery and Despair (1848) shown at the Salon of 1849, and Hunger (1850) shown at the Salon of 1850-51, are representative of his state of mind at the time and of his artistic preoccupations. Both Jules Breton works were destroyed. After Hunger was successfully shown in Brussels and Ghent, he was encouraged to move to Belgium where Jules Breton met his future wife Elodie. Elodie, who became one of his favorite models, was the daughter of Félix de Vigne, his early teacher; they were married in 1858. He returned to France in 1852. In 1853 the painter exhibited Return of the Reapers, the first of numerous rural peasant scenes based on his awareness of contemporary themes and influenced by the Jules Breton paintings of the Swiss painter Léopold Robert (1794-1835). His interest in peasant imagery was, from then on, well-established and what Jules Breton is best known for today. In 1854, he returned to the village of Courrières where Jules Breton settled. Once there, he began The Gleaners (now in the Dublin National Gallery). This work was inspired by seasonal field labor and the plight of the less fortunate who were left to gather what remained in the field after the harvest. The Gleaners received a third class medal. This award, and the success of the painting among other artists and the public, launched his career; his success continued throughout the Second Empire and beyond. the painter received commissions from the State and Jules Breton paintings were purchased by the French Art Administration and sent to provincial museums. his painting Blessing of the Wheat, Artois (Musée d'Orsay, Paris), completed in 1857 and exhibited at the Salon of the same year, brought a second class medal and was purchased by M. de Nieuwerkerke for the Imperial Museums.

Many other works from the 1850s: Recall of the Gleaners (Musée d'Orsay, Paris) or Dedication of a Calvary (Lille, Musée des Beaux-Arts), both shown at the 1859 Salon, continued to illustrate his tranquil vision of field labor influenced by the artists of the Italian Renaissance. In 1861, Jules Breton received the Legion of Honor for such works as The Colza (1860), now in the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, DC. The 1860s saw a continuation of his dedication to rural themes, but Jules Breton moved away from concentrating only on peasant life around Courrières to include views of other French regions such as the south of France in Grape Harvest (Salon of 1864), or Brittany with The Great Pilgrimage, 1869. At the 1867 Universal Exhibition, where ten of Jules Breton paintings were on view, Breton received a First Class Medal.