Jean Frédéric Bazille

Bazille took up painting after seeing the pictures of the great Romantic Eugène Delacroix. His family — wealthy wine growers in the south of France — agreed that he could study painting, but on condition that he continue his medical studies. In Paris Bazille found himself in the most revolutionary group of painters of his time. His close acquaintances included Renoir, Sisley and Monet — fellow students of a similar age in Gleyre’s studio. He regularly met Pissarro, Cézanne, Morisot, Manet and Degas. Bazille’s wealth and social position also gave him access to the most impressive salons of Paris, and his friends extended to personalities at the very top of social and artistic life. Some of his works offer an insight into the company he liked to keep. His well-known group portrait The Studio on the Rue de la Condamine, finished in 1870 shortly before his death, is a veritable “Who’s Who” of 19th-century artistic life: Renoir, leaning on the stair rail, talks to the painter, writer and critic Zacharie Astruc; Manet looks at a canvas on an easel with Monet behind him; the tall Bazille (painted by Manet) stands shyly with his back to us; and the celebrated musician Edmond Maître sits at the piano.

From the page of The Pink Dress