Gustave Courbet, realist peinter (1819-1877)

Gustave Courbet was born in Ornans in the Doubs region and studied at the College of Besançon before going to Paris to study the major painters. On returning to his native region and under the influence of the socialism of Proudhon, he became a leading figure of the realist trend. For his painting of daily reality and that of the nature of his beloved Franche-Comté, he was criticised as being ''a painter of ugliness" to which he responded "for simply painting what I saw, totally unwillingly, I raised what they call the social question". On being sentenced to 6 months of imprizonment and a heavy fine, at the sitting of the Paris commune in 1871, he sold all his works and fled to Switzerland, to La Tour-de-Peilz where he died, leaving behind him the magnificent studies of his native Franche-Comté that we know.