Jean-Baptiste Greuze

(French, 1725−1805)

Place ActiveParis, Europe

BiographyGreuze left his native Burgundy for Paris about 1750 and studied with Natoire at the Academy. Named an associate member in 1755, he first exhibited at the Salon that same year and a few months afterward began a long sojourn in Italy. He was made a full Academy member in 1769, but only in the category of genre painters, despite his efforts to be recognized as a history painter. Stung by this incident, Greuze dissociated himself from the Academy and its exhibitions until 1800. The artist’s dramatic and often moralizing genre scenes, his brilliant drawings, and his incisive portraits won him wealth, great popular acclaim, and the enthusiastic support of Diderot.

Source: Art in The Frick Collection: Paintings, Sculpture, Decorative Arts, New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1996.