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PÊCHEUR AU BORD DE LA LOUE

55.5 by 65cm., 21¾ by 25½in.

signed G. Courbet l.r.

oil on canvas

The authenticity of this work has been confirmed by Jean-Jacques Fernier, who will include it in his critical Courbet catalogue raisonné to be published by the Fondation Wildenstein.

PROVENANCE

Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris
Sale: Palais Galliera, Paris, 30 November 1961, lot 47
Collection F. B., Paris
François Baron, Paris

EXHIBITED

Paris, Durand-Ruel, no. 47

LITERATURE

Robert Fernier, La vie et l'oeuvre de Gustave Courbet, catalogue raisonné, Paris, 1977, vol. II, p. 174, no. 886, catalogued; p. 175, illustrated

NOTE

Painted circa 1873, a few years after Courbet had participated in and witnessed the defeat of the Paris Commune, the present work takes as its backdrop the surroundings of Courbet's birthplace, Ornans.

The fall-out of 1870's dramatic events continued to pre-occupy Courbet and, in a letter to fellow-artist Cherubino Pata, Courbet declared, 'I cannot even think of painting for the moment. They want me to have the Vendôme Column put back up. Everything I own is going to be seized.' (Ornans, 26 February 1873, in Petra ten-Doesschate Chu, ed., Letters of Gustave Courbet, Chicago and London, 1992, p. 489).

Against this unsettling backdrop Courbet continued to paint as best he could, seeking solace and calm in the landscape around his native Ornans he so cherished. As in the present work, Courbet often contrasted the permanence and strength of the landscape with the transience and fragility of man. The physicality of the paint, layered with a palette knife, only increases the intensity of the towering rocky cliff dwarfing the tiny fisherman, which could be interpreted as a reflection of Courbet's vulnerable position vis-à-vis the government at the time.

Jean-Jacques Fernier has suggested that the present work may have been signed by another hand at the time of execution. Indeed, judging from Courbet's correspondence, it may have been his friend Pata who added the signature, eager as he was for Courbet to finish as many paintings as possible.