Gustave COURBET (Ornans, 1819 - The Tower of Pelz, 1877) View of Saintes, taken from Lormont Canvas Signed and dated lower right: "G. Courbet 65". The painting painted in 1862 was post-dated when the artist signed it three years later. 32 x 46 cm Provenance: - Étienne Baudry (1830-1908), collector and friend of the artist. - Anonymous sale, Me Pillet, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, April 23, 1866, n° 7. - Anonymous sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, May 8, 1867, n° 13 (160 Fr). - Collection Blanc, in 1878. - Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris (acquired on March 11, 1880 and sold on April 5, 1880 to M. Bagne). - Collection Courty. - Gaston-Maurice Delestre (1913-1969), expert in old paintings and drawings. By descent. - Sale Paris, Artcurial, 22 March 2017, n° 133. Exhibitions: - Exhibition of painting and sculpture exhibited in the rooms of the Town Hall of Saintes for the benefit of the poor: 160 paintings signed Corot, Courbet, Auguin, Pradelles, Town Hall of Saintes, 1863, n°105. - Société Artistique des Bouches-du-Rhône, Marseille, 1868, n°87. - Paintings and drawings by modern masters, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris, 1878, n°44 "belonging to M. Blanc". - Courbet, Galerie Bernheim Jeune, Paris, July 1919, n°15. - Aspects de la peinture française de Courbet à Soutine, Baron Martin Museum, Gray, June-September 1961, n°52. - Gustave Courbet, Hôtel de Ville, Ornans, July-October 1962, n°18. - Gustave Courbet, Kunstmuseum, Bern, September-November 1962, n°23. - Courbet in French private collections, Galerie Claude Aubry, Paris, May-June 1966, n°11. - Autour de Courbet en Saintonge, Musée de l'Echevinage, Saintes, June-September 2007, n° 1. - Gustave Courbet, une histoire intime, Musée de l'Echevinage, Saintes, August-October 2019, no number, reproduced p. 73 in the catalog. Bibliography: - Alexandre Estignard, Courbet, sa Vie et ses œuvres, Besançon, 1896, p. 170. - Georges Riat, Gustave Courbet, peintre, Paris, 1906, p. 199. - Théodore Duret, Courbet, Paris, 1918, p. 58-61. - Charles Dangibeaud, Courbet à Saintes, Revue de Saintonge, August 1919, p. 295. - Charles Léger, Courbet, Paris, 1929, p. 95. - Charles Léger, Courbet et son temps, Paris, 1948, p. 85. - Gerstle Mack, Gustave Courbet, New York, 1951, p. 168. - Gaston Delestre, Courbet et Corot à Saintes, in. Bulletin des Amis de Gustave Courbet, n° 27, pp. 1-5. - Robert Fernier, En voyage avec Courbet, 1966, p. 51 (reproduced). - Roger Bonniot, Gustave Courbet en Saintonge, Paris, 1973, p. 102 (reproduced fig. 25). - Robert Fernier, La vie et l'œuvre de Gustave Courbet, catalog raisonné, Lausanne - Paris, 1977, t. I, p. 200-201, n° 346. - Pierre Courthion, Tout l'œuvre peint de Gustave Courbet, Paris, 1999, n° 325, p. 91 (reproduced). - M. Pantazzi, V. Pomarède, G. Tinterow, Corot 1796-1875, cat. exp., Paris, Grand Palais, 1996; Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, 1996; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1996-1997, p. 337. - Guy Scaon, Courbet and the landscape in Saintonge, in. Arcades, Poitou Charentes, 2007, p. 38 (reproduced). - Alexandre Bruand, Courbet. Une année en Saintonge in L'Actualité Poitou-Charente, n° 79, January 2008, p. 44 (reproduced). - Yvonne Melia-Sevrain, Étienne Baudry. Une vie charentaise, châtelain, dandy et écrivain militant, Saintes, 2010, p. 143-168. - D. de Font-Réaulx, B. Guidi, M.-L. Pacelli, I Pludermacher, V. Pomarède, Courbet e la natura, cat. exp., Ferrara, Palazzo dei Diamanti, 2018-2019, p. 185, (reproduced fig. 66). This landscape, remarkably documented and well known in Courbet's historiography, is one of the most remarkable testimonies of the artist's stay in Saintes, in the present-day department of Charente-Maritime, from late May 1862 to March 1863. The initiative for this trip came from the journalist Jules-Antoine Castagnary, himself a native of Saintes who regularly stayed there in summer. Initially, the painter was only supposed to spend a few weeks in this region, but the warm welcome he received, the artistic emulation, the meeting with Corot, as well as the seduction operated on him as much by the place as by a sentimental adventure, made him change his plans. It was thus for almost ten months that Courbet stayed in the region, sumptuously received at the home of Étienne Baudry (1830-1908), a notable republican, at the Château de Rochemont in Fontcouverte, located two kilometers from Saintes. This patron owned the Demoiselles du bord de la Seine (Salon of 1857, Paris, Musée du Petit-Palais), and also collected works by Boudin, Manet, Jongking, Pissarro and Monet. The stay continued at the home of the Saint-Etienne merchant Jules Borreau and his wife Laure, whose lover Courbet became, and again at Baudry's. Camille Corot, who was painting in La Rochelle at the time, joined his colleagues in August, forming the short-lived open-air studio known as the "Port-Berteau group", named after a place near Saintes. Courbet and Corot, despite their differences in age and temperament, lived together with