ABSTRACT
In France, as elsewhere on the Continent and in England, the cult of nature flourished throughout the eighteenth century and produced, among other manifestations, various kinds of naturalist landscape painting. French artists, like their British contemporaries, sought to free themselves from artistic stereotypes by studying nature in nature, under the open sky and in the light of day, and to record their observations in un-composed, portrait-like landscapes, using both oils and watercolors. During the period of David's dominance, landscape painting—considered to be, at best, of second rank—was officially tolerated only when it conformed to the types established by Poussin, Dughet, and Claude. Corot's work links the tradition of French neoclassicism with nineteenth-century currents of naturalism, and ultimately with Impressionism. The essentially painterly quality of his best work resists verbal analysis, and the simplicity and profundity of his character have baffled interpreters.
