The oeuvre of Gustave Courbet comprises around 1,000 works. Only 50 of these are nudes, including the infamous L'Origine du monde from 1866, which was largely hidden from the public before it ended up in the Musée d'Orsay in 1995.
Related: The 10 Most Scandalous Artworks
Measuring just 46 x 55 cm, L'Origine du monde was an intimate commissioned work for the Ottoman diplomat and art collector Halil Şerif Pasha. Measuring 83.3 x 160 cm, Courbet's Grande baigneuse (also called Femme nue couchée au bord de l'eau), which he painted three years later, has completely different dimensions. In 2013, the painting was discovered in a collection and thoroughly researched (the provenance could not be traced), before it was finally recognized by the Musée Courbet in Ornans and by the Société Courbet in Geneva and was exhibited in 2019 in the exhibition celebrating the painter's 200th birthday at the Musee Courbet.
On June 4, Grande Baigneuse will go under the hammer at the 35th Garden Party auction of the Rouillac auction house at the Château d'Artigny in Touraine. The estimated price is €300,000-500,000 (about $330,000-550,000).
Related: Five Centuries of the Nude in Painting
The work fits perfectly into the series of nude paintings by Gustave Courbet, who repeatedly explored this genre throughout his career. Courbet harmonized the depiction of bare flesh with his preferred subject: realistic landscape painting.
Courbet repeatedly approached nude painting in different ways. The small number of these works in his extensive oeuvre may be due to his intensive research and exploration of the subject. His works marry an almost academic flawlessness with a natural representation full of open-hearted eroticism.
White sheets and forest landscapes with ponds and streams inspired by his homeland of Ornans can be found repeatedly, as in Grande baigneuse, which shows the protagonist in a casual pose reminiscent of Titian's Venus of Urbino, on the bank of a waterway. While one hand plays with the curls of loose brown hair, the fingers of the other hand are dipped in the water.
Related: An Artistic Representation of Breasts Throughout the Centuries
As can be deduced from an art dealer's label on the back of the canvas, Grande baigneuse was painted around 1869, when Gustave Courbet was at the height of his fame. Also celebrated internationally, Courbet was represented at the International Art Exhibition in the Glass Palace in Munich in the autumn of that year with a large hunting painting, which was very well received there. While still in Munich he began the nude painting La dame de Munich, which he completed in Ornans. Until the discovery of Grande baigneuse, the date of which cannot be precisely stated, the now lost work was regarded as the last nude painting by Gustave Courbet, who died in exile in Switzerland in 1877.
Want articles like this straight to your inbox? Then register today for our free newsletter!
In addition to the important work of Gustave Courbet, the Rouillac Garden Party auction features a whole range of exceptional and exciting lots, including a wooden Citroën 2 CV, a 17th-century Mughal Indian talismanic shirt and a version of Lavinia Fontana's portrait of Antonietta Gonsalvus.
Check out Barnebys Magazine for more news from the auction market!
