Jules
Bastien-Lepage
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(November 1, 1848 - December 10, 1884), French
painter, was born in the village of Damvillers, Meuse and spent his
childhood there.
He first studied at
Verdun, and prompted by a love of art went in 1867 to Paris, where
he was admitted to the École des Beaux-arts, working under Cabanel.
After exhibiting in the Salons of 1870 and 1872 works which
attracted no attention, in 1874 he made his mark with his Song of
Spring, a study of rural life, representing a peasant girl sitting
on a knoll looking down on a village. His Portrait of my
Grandfather, exhibited in the same year, was not less remarkable for
its artless simplicity and received a third-class medal.
This success was
confirmed in 1875 by the First Communion, a picture of a little girl
minutely worked up as to color, and a Portrait of M. Hayern. In 1875
he took the second Prix de Rome with his Angels appearing to the
Shepherds, exhibited again in 1878. His next endeavour to win the
Grand Prix de Rome in 1876 with Priam at the Feet of Achilles was
again unsuccessful (it is in the Lille gallery), and the painter
determined to return to country life. To the Salon of 1877 he sent a
full-length Portrait of Lady L. and My Parents; and in 1878 a
Portrait of M. Theuriet and The Hayfield. The last picture, now in
the Luxembourg, is regarded as a typical work from its stamp of
realistic truth.
Thenceforth Bastien-Lepage was recognized in France as the leader of
a school, and his Portrait of Mlle Sarah Bernhardt (1879), painted
in a light key, won him the cross of the Legion of Honour. In 1880
he exhibited a small portrait of M. Andrieux and Joan Of Arc
listening to the Voices; and in the same year, at the Royal Academy,
the little portrait of the Prince of Wales. In 1881 he painted The
Beggar and the Portrait Of Albert Wolf; in 1882 Le Père Jacques; in
1885 Love in a Village, in which we find some trace of Gustave
Courbet's influence. His last dated work is The Forge (1884).
The artist, long
ailing, had tried in vain to re-establish his health in Algiers. He
died in Paris on December 10, 1884, when planning a new series of
rural subjects.
Among his more
important works, may also be mentioned the portrait of Mme J. Drouet
(1883); Gambetta on his death-bed, and some landscapes; The Vintage
(1880), and The Thames at London (1882). The Little Chimney-Sweep
was never finished. An exhibition of his collected works was opened
in March and April 1885. A museum is devoted to him at Montmédy.
