Jean-Paul LAURENS (Fourquevaux, 1838 - Paris, 1921 ) A scholar Original canvas by Paul Foinet Signed lower right: "Jean Paul Laurens Old label : " JP Laurens n° 951 Le Savant ". 66,4 x 52 cm At the turn of the 1880s-1890s, Laurens multiplied his interior views featuring monks and scholars: Faust (1885, not located) or The Alchemist (1889, Toulouse, Musée des Augustins). This production, probably influenced by Dutch painting of the Golden Age, that of Rembrandt and Dou, constitutes an avatar, probably more commercial, of his great historical paintings exhibited at the Salon. It features furniture and accessories, windows, books and architectural details identical to those in his suite of paintings on the Inquisition. Breaking with the dramatic atmosphere of this cycle, Laurens imagined genre scenes that could be acquired by an amateur public. Our painting could echo Meissonier's Poet (Paris, Musée du Louvre) or White Reader (Paris, Musée d'Orsay), executed in the 1840s. If Meissonier's historical caprices begin with Louis XIII and end with the First Empire, Laurens' historical caprices begin with the Merovingians and end with the reign of Louis XII.