Théodule-Augustin Ribot (August 8, 1823 – September 11, 1891) was a French
realistRealism in the visual arts and literature is the depiction of subjects as they appear in everyday life, without embellishment or interpretation...
painter.
He was born in
Saint-Nicolas-d'Attez Saint-Nicolas-d'Attez is a commune in the Eure department in Haute-Normandie in northern France.-References:*...
, and studied at the École des Arts et Metiers de Chalons before moving to Paris in 1845. There he found work decorating gilded frames for a mirror manufacturer; he also studied in the studio of Auguste-Barthélémy Glaize. After a trip to
AlgeriaAlgeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, is a country located in North Africa. It is the largest country on the Mediterranean sea, the second largest on the African continent and the eleventh-largest country in the world in terms of land area.It is bordered by Tunisia in...
around 1848, he returned in 1851 to Paris, where he continued to make his living as an artisan.
Théodule-Augustin Ribot (August 8, 1823 – September 11, 1891) was a French
realistRealism in the visual arts and literature is the depiction of subjects as they appear in everyday life, without embellishment or interpretation...
painter.
He was born in
Saint-Nicolas-d'Attez Saint-Nicolas-d'Attez is a commune in the Eure department in Haute-Normandie in northern France.-References:*...
, and studied at the École des Arts et Metiers de Chalons before moving to Paris in 1845. There he found work decorating gilded frames for a mirror manufacturer; he also studied in the studio of Auguste-Barthélémy Glaize. After a trip to
AlgeriaAlgeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, is a country located in North Africa. It is the largest country on the Mediterranean sea, the second largest on the African continent and the eleventh-largest country in the world in terms of land area.It is bordered by Tunisia in...
around 1848, he returned in 1851 to Paris, where he continued to make his living as an artisan. In the late 1850s, working at night by lamplight, he began to paint seriously, depicting everyday subjects in a realistic style.
He made his
SalonThe Salon , or rarely Paris Salon , beginning in 1725 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Between 1748–1890 it was the greatest annual or biannual art event in the western world...
debut in 1861 with several paintings of kitchen subjects. Collectors purchased the works, and his paintings in the Salons of 1864 and 1865 were awarded medals.
Ribot painted domestic genre works, still-lifes,
portraitA portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the person. For this reason, in photography a portrait is generally not a...
s, and religious scenes. His preference was for painting directly from nature, emphasizing the contrasts of light and dark. His use of
chiaroscuroChiaroscuro is a term in art for a contrast between light and dark. The term is usually applied to bold contrasts affecting a whole composition, but is also more technically used by artists and art historians for the use of effects representing contrasts of light, not necessarily strong, to...
to suggest psychological states grew from his admiration for Spanish and Dutch
baroqueBaroque is an artistic style prevalent from the late 16th century to the early 18th century. The popularity and success of the Baroque style was encouraged by the Roman Catholic Church, which had decided at the time of the Council of Trent that the arts should communicate religious themes in...
masters such as Ribera and Rembrandt, an enthusiasm shared by his contemporaries
CourbetJean Désiré Gustave Courbet was a French painter who led the Realist movement in 19th-century French painting. The Realist movement bridged the Romantic movement , with the Barbizon School and the Impressionists...
and
BonvinFrançois Bonvin was a French realist painter.Bonvin was born in humble circumstances in Paris, the son of a police officer and a seamstress. When he was four years old his mother died of tuberculosis and young François was left in the care of an old woman who underfed him...
. Members of Ribot's family are the likely models for many of his figure compositions, in which the subjects engage in humble activities, such as preparing meals or gathering in groups to read to each other. The light draws attention to faces and hands, which emerge sharply from dimly lit surroundings.
Although the realism of Ribot's work aligns him with the most progressive artists of the generation preceding the
ImpressionistsImpressionism was a 19th-century art movement that began as a loose association of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence in the 1870s and 1880s...
, he was no revolutionary, and his work met with a generally favorable response from the public and from critics.
In 1878 Ribot received the
Légion d'honneurThe Légion d'honneur or Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
. At about this time, in ill health, he stopped painting and moved to
ColombesColombes is a commune in the north-western suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris.-Name:The name Colombes comes from Latin columna , meaning "column"...
, where he died in 1891.