The Artist:
Jean-Leon Gerome (1824-1904). French painter and sculptor. He was a pupil of Paul Delaroche and inherited his highly finished academic style. Gerome travelled widely in Turkey, Egypt and North Africa. A sculptor as well as a painter, his female figures have the same classical precision of Ingres, but are in much more realistic poses. His best-known works are his oriental scenes. Two typical examples are in the Wallace Collection, London. They won Gerome great popularity and he had considerable influence as an upholder of academic tradition and enemy of progressive trends in art. He was not a big fan of Impressionist art.