An entire room devoted to Gustave Courbet
This room brings together around a dozen paintings by Gustave Courbet, from youthful self-portraits to the bolder scenes of his mature years — a large enough group to trace, within a single room, the evolution of a painter who built his career in constant opposition to the official art of his time.
1. A young man and his dog, the only painting accepted out of three
The Self-Portrait with a Black Dog, painted in 1842 and reworked in 1844, is one of Courbet's very first paintings accepted at the official Paris Salon, which opened in March 1844 at the Louvre — of three canvases submitted by the young, then almost unknown painter, only this one was selected by the jury, under the neutral title Portrait of the Author. Courbet shows himself seated in the grass, a black dog beside him, in a pose already marked by the self-assurance that would define his entire career.
2. A painting banned from public display for over a century
Le Sommeil (The Sleepers), painted in 1866, shows two nude women asleep, entwined in a rumpled bed — a broken pearl necklace and a hairpin, left on the sheet, leave little doubt about the scene's nature. The painting was commissioned by the Ottoman diplomat Halil Şerif Pasha, known as Khalil Bey, a Paris-based collector who also owned Courbet's other scandalous painting, The Origin of the World.
When a dealer tried to exhibit it in 1872, Le Sommeil became the subject of a police report for indecency. The painting was not permitted to be shown publicly again until 1988 — more than a century after it was painted.
How much time
Compare the confident pose of the 1844 young Courbet to the unabashed boldness of the mature Courbet: it's the same self-assurance, applied to two very different registers.
- Self-Portrait with a Black Dog — 8 minutes.
- Le Sommeil and the rest of the room — 12 minutes.
Sources and verification
Checked against the official notices of the Petit Palais (petitpalais.paris.fr / parismuseescollections.paris.fr) and cross-checked with Wikipedia EN/FR.
- Petit Palais — Courbet with a black dog
- Wikipédia FR — Autoportrait au chien noir
- Wikipedia EN — Le Sommeil
- The Daily Beast — The Muslim Playboy Behind Paris' Most Scandalous Painting
Displays and room openings can change. Check the Petit Palais website on the day of your visit before following a route.
Continue your visit
Petit Palais, Paris
Listen to the commentary in the gallery
This route gives you a thread to follow. In front of an artwork, CulturAll adds the audio commentary: photograph the work or its label, listen, then ask your questions.
