(Ornans 1819–1877 La Tour-de-Peilz)

People walking along the Seine. Circa 1852.

Oil on panel.

Inscribed lower right: G. Courbet.

24.7 × 38.5 cm.

Provenance:
- Collection of Aurélien Scholl, France.
- Private collection France.
- Sale Koller, Zurich, 23.9.2011, Lot 3228.
- Swiss private collection.

Exhibited:
Geneva 2012, Gustave Courbet (1817–1877). Sur les sentiers de l'exil. Palais des expositions, Geneva, 25.–29.4.2012, no. 10.

Literature:
Exh. cat. Gustave Courbet (1817–1877). Sur les sentiers de l'exil. Palais des expositions, Geneva 2012, p. 23, no. 10 (with colour ill.).

In 2011, Jean-Jacques Fernier identified this painting as a collaboration between Gustave Courbet and François-Louis Français (1814–1897) and dated it circa 1852. In a summer atmosphere, a woman and a child walk along a river, with their backs to the viewer. In his certificate (a copy of which is available), Jean-Jacques Fernier notes a special significance to this composition: Courbet had a long relationship with a painter's model from Dieppe named Virginie Binet, who gave birth to a son in 1847, of whom she claimed Courbet was the father. Abandoned by Courbet, mother and son returned to Dieppe in 1852. This story may have prompted François-Louis Français, a close friend of Courbet, to create this image, in which the woman and child in the foreground turn their backs on the viewer. Fernier identifies the landscape as the Seine near the island of Bougival, a popular meeting place for the artists of the time who rebelled against the Academy.