Charles François Daubigny

Charles Francois Daubigny, son of the classical landscape painter Edmond-François Daubigny (1789-1843), was born in on the 15th February 1817 in Paris. After initially training with his father, Daubigny was apprenticed to an engraver. During this period he sketched extensively in the environs of Paris and the Forest of Fontainebleau and in 1835 he travelled to Italy. After a year spent studying the paintings of Old Masters, Daubigny returned to Paris and began to paint historical and religious works. In 1838 he enrolled in the class of Paul Delaroche at the École des Beaux-Arts and successfully submitted to the Paris Salon. During his time as an engraver, Daubigny had illustrated books, but his true leanings were toward landscape painting as practiced by the Barbizon School, an informal association of painters who rebelled against the formulas of traditional landscape painting in favour of working out-of-doors, directly from nature. Like Camille Corot, Daubigny painted in the Morvan district and in 1852, after the two had met, Daubigny's work began to depend on a strict observation of tonal values and an accurate analysis of nature. He increasingly employed graduated light reflections from surfaces to give the effect of space, a technique later used by the Impressionists to convey a momentary impression of a landscape. In 1857 he acquired his studio boat in which he explored the rivers Seine, Marne and Oise. He settled in Auvers-sur-Oise in 1860 but continued to travel around France. He plein-air style was an important influence on the Impressionists and his young friend, Claude Monet was inspired by his example to acquire a studio boat in 1872.