Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot: Beginning

“My spirits.... now lean towards sadness and melancholy. I too am beginning to feel my age. Then, as one moves on in life sorrows multiply, and necessarily it is harder to keep cheerful... [I experienced] violent disappointments, that I might even call grief.”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Quote in Corot's letter to Jean-Gabriel Scheffer, 27 Dec. 1845; as quoted in Corot, Gary Tinterow, Michael Pantazzi, Vincent Pomarède - Galeries nationales du Grand Palais (France), National Gallery of Canada, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.), 1996, p. 142
this is one of the very few negative expressions by Corot; he is then 49.
1820 - 1850

Life , Age , Sadness , Disappointment

“I have learned from experience that it is useful to begin by drawing one's picture clearly on a virgin canvas, first having noted the desired effect on a white or gray paper, and then to do the picture section by section, as immediately finished as one can, so that when it has all been covered there is very little to retouch. I have noticed that whatever is finished at one sitting is fresher, better drawn, and profits more from many lucky accidents, while when one retouches this initial harmonious glow is lost. I think that this method is particularly good for foliage, which needs a good deal of freedom.”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Quote from Corot's 'Notebooks', ca. 1828, as quoted in Artists on Art – from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. by Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, pp. 239 – 240
1820 - 1850

Thinking , Freedom , Learning , Drawing

“You can see the pains I take to hide the attachment [of the muscles] at the clavicles and sternum, to soften the modeling of the ribs where it seems that the breasts just begin to swell; I try to go about it entirely differently from the usual way, which is above all to show what one knows. As this is not an anatomy lesson, I must bind together as seen in nature everything covering the armatures that make up and support the body, in order to put down only what I experience faced with these tissues of flesh that let one sens the blood beneath, while they reflect the light of the sky. In a word, I must bring to the painting of that breast the same artlessness I would employ in painting a bottle of milk.”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Corot explains his making of the painting to his biographer Alfred Robaut, c. 1869; as quoted in Corot, Gary Tinterow, Michael Pantazzi, Vincent Pomarède - Galeries nationales du Grand Palais (France), National Gallery of Canada, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.), 1996, p. 277
about his painting 'Landscape with Figures', also called 'La Toilette', Corot painted in 1859
1860s

Pain , Way , Support , Nature

“The first two things to study are form and values. For me, these are the bases of what is serious art. Color and finish put charm into one’s work.... it seems to me very important to begin by an indication of the darkest values (assuming that the canvas is white), and to continue in order to the lightest value. From the darkest to the lightest I would establish twenty shades... Never lose sight of that first impression by which you were moved. Begin by determining your composition. Then the values – the relation of the forms to the values. These are the basis. Then the color, and finally the finish.”

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Quote from Corot's 'Notebooks', ca. 1828, as quoted in Artists on Art – from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. by Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, p. 240
1820 - 1850

Art , Color , Study