Théodule Ribot (1823-1891) The Well - Farmyard

Théodule RIBOT
(Saint Nicolas d'Attez, 1823 – Colombes 1891)
The well
Oil on canvas
H. 31.5 cm; W. 24.5 cm
Signed lower left
Located on the back on the frame “Lourtay”?

Augustin Théodule Ribot is the son of a civil engineer and first studied geometric work and linear drawing. Destined for an artistic career, he entered the School of Arts and Crafts in Châlons-en-Champagne and went to Paris in 1845, where he was employed as a workshop assistant while studying under the painter Auguste-Barthélemy Glaize. After a three-year stay in Algeria to supervise and direct construction projects, he returned to Paris in 1851 and supported himself by producing a large number of drawings for industrialists and also copies of Antoine Watteau for the United States during the day, while painting for himself at night. He appeared at the Salon from 1861, where he began with six canvases of kitchen and farmyard interiors that made him known to the general public. He then exhibited, among others, Prayer of the Little Girls, Morning Toilet (1864), Song of the Song, Tinners, The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian (1865) acquired by the State for Luxembourg, Christ among the Doctors, The Flute Player (1866), The Torture of the Corners, of very remarkable energy, An Old Man (1867) The Oyster and the Litigants (1868) acquired for the Caen Museum, Puppets in the Village, The Philosophers (1869). He obtained a 1st class medal in 1864 and 1865, but also a 1st class medal at the Universal Exhibition of 1878. He moved to Colombes at this time, but fell ill and gradually abandoned painting. Théodule Ribot also successfully produced etchings and watercolors, historical scenes, religious compositions, still lifes, portraits and genre scenes.

Our work is quite atypical in Ribot's corpus. It is not made of shadows, but on the contrary, of points of light, composed however of everyday popular objects, arranged in their usual place. The whitewashed courtyard which shelters the well, central subject, is covered with ground cover vegetation. The various brooms, buckets, basins and watering can are arranged naturally but in such a way as to form a still life which one could almost consider a family portrait. Signed on the back of the brush, this canvas is in a perfect state of original preservation, on its stretcher, on the back of which Ribot has again signed, and most certainly located the scene.