Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796-1875) was born into a solidly bourgeoisie family in Paris who had survived not only the Revolution of the previous decade, but the Days of Terror that followed. Jean-Baptiste's father, who had once been a hairdresser (recall the elaborate coiffeurs of the French court), was now a clothier in the rue de Bac and his mother was a modiste. Few could have predicted that their son would be a painter, let alone one of France's greatest landscape painters. Except perhaps for Camille (as his family called him) himself. To his parents, friends, and teachers he was simply the dutiful son, the loyal companion, the mediocre student: he lacked―in their eyes―the requisite temperament, the passion, that a true painter needed. In truth, the passion was there, but it took the form of an immovable rock rather than that of fire. He was steady, thorough, kind, mild, generous, obliging―and unyielding in his determination to be a painter. Whereas he obeyed his father and went into business, he also studied painting in every spare moment.
So things went until Corot was 26. His father finally relented and agreed to provide him with a small living allowance―not without admonishing him, however, that he had been prepared to give him a sum 50 times greater had he set up in a respectable and useful business such as textiles. Who, after all, could support even himself, not to mention a wife and children, in a business as frivolous as painting? The question turned out to be moot: Corot never married and his father continued to support him until Camille was well into his middle age.
Corot seemed happy with this arrangement and with the time bought by this financial freedom also bought some professional art lessons (although he is usually considered to be a more or less self-taught artist). In 1825 he went to Italy for additional study and remained there for three years. He would return to Italy twice more for briefer stays: in 1834, when he was in his late 30s, and again in 1843 when he was approaching his 50s. (It should be noted, at least in passing, that Corot was not favorably impressed with the work of Michelangelo.) In the meantime, his father's prescience seemed to be correct: Corot did not sell a single painting until he was in his early 40s. On the other hand, Corot's persistence also proved to be correct. Waiting patiently like a peasant for the invisible seed to come up, Corot began his harvest in the mid-1850s and continued almost until his death in 1875, not long before his 80th birthday. He also, from the age of 60 onward, made a very comfortable living from his pictures. Ironically, his father was unaware of his son's success: he had died seven years earlier.
Although Corot has been known primarily for his landscape paintings, he also made a group of figure paintings, especially in these later years. Often overlooked because of the landscapes, they too have among them examples of his finest work (JAMA cover, June 14, 2000). Mother Protecting Her Child (cover), completed between 1855 and 1858, is one of them. Like those of Mary Cassatt, his younger contemporary, Corot's subjects were women and children; rarely did he paint male figures. Typically, the women, though defenseless, are far from weak. If they show fear, as in Mother Protecting Her Child, they also show a resoluteness and determination to protect their offspring regardless of cost―a shadow, perhaps, of the cost that Corot had expended on his career. Can anyone doubt that this woman will protect her child even to her last breath? But it is not only mothers and children Corot has portrayed. If he portrays the woman as a gypsy on stage, he is able to capture the mysterious forces from deep within her soul as expressed by the dance; if as a mythological figure, he portrays the woman as every inch a goddess despite her human body; and if as a peasant, he portrays her as earth's daughter, as heroic as Millet's are maudlin.
Corot's long life took him through many styles of painting: from the time of the huge, academic mythological and historical machines that covered the walls of the Salon in his youth, through the weepings and sentimentalities of the Romantics, to finally, in his old age, the smaller, more casual, "spontaneous" creations of the Impressionists (whose daubs he did not like) that sprang up outside the Salon walls and were relegated to "unofficial" showings in dealers' shops and self-created galleries. Through it all Corot maintained an equanimity, a serenity, and a generosity―even to those he did not like―that endeared him to all. On the other hand, Corot did not make it easy for art historians. Even during his lifetime Corot's pictures were frequently copied, sometimes, no doubt, as a learning exercise for a neophyte, but as time has proved, most often as deliberate forgeries. But even so, Corot remained kind and generous. It is reported that when a purchaser brought one such unsigned forgery (or legitimate copy) to Corot, he signed it to make the buyer happy. Though the story may be apocryphal, if it is true, then Corot has created a new, hybrid form of art: a work part authentic, part forgery.
One can only hope that the obliging Corot thought the forgery worthy of his name. "Caveat emptor," meanwhile, takes on a whole new meaning.
M. Therese Southgate, MD
The Cover Section Editor: M. Therese Southgate, MD, Senior Contributing Editor.
JAMA. 2007;297:1035.
