Souvenir de Mortefontaine [SEP] creator
Souvenir de Mortefontaine
Souvenir de Mortefontaine (Recollection of Mortefontaine) is an 1864 oil-on-canvas painting by French artist Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. It is a scene of tranquillity: a woman and children quietly enjoying themselves by a glass-flat, tree-flanked lake.
Generally acknowledged as one of his masterpieces, it is among the most successful of Corot's later, more poetic works. The painting captures an idealized scene while still drawing from the real world. Corot's early painting showed Realist
a second similar painting, "The Boatman of Mortefontaine" (1865–70), which shows the same lake and trees from the same perspective. Changes in the features of the landscape in "The Boatman" from those depicted in "Souvenir" hint at the paintings being generalised impressions rather than details captured from life.
"Souvenir de Mortefontaine" was purchased in 1864 for the French state directly from Corot through Napoleon III's Civil List, and after hanging at Fontainebleau for 25 years it was transferred to the Louvre in 1889