Thomas Couture (French, 1815-1879)

Thomas Couture (French, 1815-1879), "Portrait of a Girl", oil on canvas, initialed lower right, 15 3/4 in. x 12 3/8 in., unframed. Note: Thomas Couture was born in 1815 approximately thrity miles north of Paris in Senlis, France. He had very little ambition or interest in education growing up, much to his father’s displeasure. He was, however, considered a talented artist at a young age. His family moved to Paris when he was eleven years old, and he later enrolled at the industrial arts school, École des Arts et Métiers. He then studied in the atelier of artist Antoine-Jean Gros who became like a father figure to Couture. In 1831, he was admitted to the École des Beaux Arts, but his relationship with the organization eventually become strained because of Couture’s strong independent streak and break with the educational ideals of the institution.Couture painted his most well-known work “Les Romains de la décadence” which was an allegory of the French Monarchy overthrown in the 1848 Revolution. After the success of this and other influential works, Couture set up a popular independent studio of his own where he taught Edouard Manet, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Marcellin Desboutin, Anselm Feuerbach and William Morris Hunt among others. It is believed that Couture set up his atelier in opposition to the École des Beaux Arts. Couture caused further conflict by publishing a book of his own teachings and methods titled Méthode et Entretiens d'Atelier which championed an informal art education. He writes in the preface to the book, “I now see that I might have avoided many of my labors…the desire to put upon canvas that which captivated me, guided me better than words which seemed useless. It was instinct in me, and to follow the dictates of my heart was easy…” Couture was also a talented portrait painter and was commissioned to produce a great number of them in his lifetime after the success of his early history paintings. He primarily painted aristocrats and powerful political figures, but he also drew and painted charming and detailed portraits of fellow artists, women and children. In his Methode et Entretiens d’Atelier he focuses a chapter on the methods of painting portraiture where he writes “…make all your forms and lines in accordance with that which constitutes beauty, keeping within the limits of truth, and you will obtain a result astonishing to every one.” Couture’s interest in portraiture waned later in his life most likely because of his bitterness and dislike for the upper-class patrons he was used to flattering in his work. He much preferred to draw likenesses or even quick painted studies of his friends, students and family. In the portraits offered in these lots, Couture captured the likenesses of two unidentified young women and a student of his, artist Charles Monginot. While these works are not as studied as his more formal commissioned portraits, in all of them there is an endearing spontaneity—a spark of light—that conveys the fleeting expression of each sitter. Ref.: Couture, Thomas. Conversations on Art Methods. Translated by S. E. Stewart. G.P. New York: Putnam’s Sons, 1879.
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