Throughout his career, Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) was willing to be a model, sometimes pensive, arrogant or bruised: "I made my life many portraits of me, as and when I changed situation of spirit; I wrote my life, in a word, "he wrote. Originally from Ornans, the artist represents himself here in a landscape of his native Franche-Comté. The high chalk cliff offers a striking contrast to the black of the costume and the dog. The young artist stopped, posing behind him his cane and his sketchbook. Proud of his beautiful appearance, he donned the workwear of the outdoor student painter but the dandy's, with his checked trousers and finely lined jacket. The broad-brimmed hat, the abundant cascading hair and the pipe belong to the panoply of rapins (young artists) of the time. At twenty-five years old, the rebel Courbet strove nothing less than to revolutionize painting. His training, he acquired from the great old people frequented in the Louvre, the Venetians, Rembrandt, Frans Hals, Rubens, Ribera or Caravaggio, copying Géricault and Delacroix, observing the nature. He asserts himself in a sincere art, sweeping conventions to better serve reality. Admired by Baudelaire, he was an essential reference for the painters of the following generations, the Impressionists in Cézanne.
This portrait imposes itself by its freshness of observation, the solidity of its paste, the inner energy that it expresses. Touch artist, Courbet perfectly renders the grain of the stone, the silky coat of the spaniel. In 1844, this painting opens the doors of the Salon, the prestigious annual exhibition of painting and sculpture. The date 1842 appearing on the painting seems to have been added a posteriori by the artist.
