Gustave Courbet

Jean Désiré Gustave Courbet was a French painter who spearheaded the 19th-century Realism movement. Fiercely independent and politically radical, Courbet declared that painting was an essentially concrete art that should only consist of the representation of real, existing things, famously asserting: 'Show me an angel and I will paint one!'

In 1850, Courbet shocked the Salon with monumental canvases like A Burial at Ornans and The Stone Breakers, according humble rural peasants and labourers the colossal scale previously reserved only for royalty and biblical history. When his works were rejected by the 1855 Universal Exposition, he built his own independent 'Pavilion of Realism' across the street, anticipating modern independent exhibitions.