Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) - Le Château de Thoraise

signed 'G.Courbet' (lower left) - oil on canvas - 26 x 34 in. (66 x 86.4 cm) - Painted circa 1870. Estimate: £70,000-100,000

Provenance : Mme Patrick de Bayser, Paris.
with Jacques Seligman & Co., New York.
acquired from the above by Henry Luce, III, December 1959.

Literature: Exhibition catalogue, Gustave Courbet, 1819-1877, Philadelphia, 1960, pp. 84-85, no. 52 (illustrated).

Exhibited: Philadelphia, Museum of Art, and Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Gustave Courbet, 1819-1877, December 1959-April 1960, no. 52 (on loan from Henry Luce, III).

Notes: The present picture is a fine example of the subject and composition that dominated the artistic output of Gustave Courbet during the 1870s, when Camille Pissaro credited Courbet with inventing 'une campagne moderne (É. Zola, Écrits sur l'art, Paris, 1991, p. 205)'. Featuring a castle in Franche-Comté on the Franco-Swiss border, this work is similar to a series of landscapes featuring châteaux that Gustave Courbet painted after his exile from Paris during this period.

As is evident in the present work, these landscapes broke with classical principles of composition. Here the long, low, limestone wall that runs nearly the length of the picture effectively divides the composition into two contrasting planes: the lower plane is a lush, dark, green landscape, whilst above the wall rise the chalky cliff face and château.

These two planes are linked by the central feature of the composition, a stately lime tree. Every element of the composition directs the gaze towards the tree: the low white wall runs to its trunk, the stone ridge on the right disappears within its leaves, and the cliff edge frames it on the left. But the tree is nevertheless the darkest element of the composition, breaking with the classical tradition of highlighting central focal points.

This work has been examined and authenticated by Sarah Faunce and will be included in her forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist's paintings.

Jean-Jacques Fernier will include this painting in his forthcoming supplement to the catalogue raisonné as "Courbet et collaboration", dating the work to circa 1873, and suggesting in a letter dated 18 October 2006 that the work was painted with the assistance of Courbet's pupil Ernest Brigot.

Christie's. 19th Century European Art. 23 January 2008, 2:00 pm. 8 King Street, St. James's, London