Millet, Jean-François

(1814-1875)

   painter, engraver

   A significant landscape and genre artist of the barbizon school, Jean-François Millet, the son of peasants, was born in Gréville, Manche. He studied painting at Cherbourg, then at studios in Paris where, at the louvre, he was influenced by the works of Nicolas poussin, Peter Paul Rubens, and the spanish painters. To make a living, he painted a number of mythological and amorous subjects inspired by jean-honoré fragonard and Correg-gio. He also painted a number of detailed and finely executed portraits (Pauline Ono, 1843; Naval Officer, 1845). In 1848, he exhibited The Winnower and, at the end of 1849, settled permanently at Barbizon, where in contrast to his fellow land-scapists, he devoted himself to painting familiar peasant scenes. Millet had a classic sense of composition and gave his figures a monumental character; his technique was sometimes heavy and strongly worked. From 1860 on, he began to be recognized and, toward the end of his life, gave more emphasis to landscapes, lightening his pallet and searching for the effects of nature (Spring, 1873). Some of his paintings, in their sense of pathos and extreme freedom of execution, recall honoré daumier.