Mère Grégoire
Gustave Courbet (French, 1819–1877)1855, reworked 1857–59
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Materials & printing
Archival matte paper, 189 g/m² (10.3 mil), sourced from Japan, printed with multicolor water-based inkjet so every brushstroke stays crisp. Framed prints arrive ready to hang in a .75″ ayous-wood frame with an acrylite front. Sized to standard frames by cropping, never stretching — at most about 3% comes off one edge, which isn’t noticeable on most pieces, and we only offer a size when it stays that small.
Shipping & returns
Made to order and delivered in 5–8 business days (2–4 to print, 3–4 in transit). US shipping only for now. Because each print is made for your order, all sales are final — but if it arrives damaged or defective, send us a photo within 14 days and we’ll replace it free. Full policy.
Why is it this affordable?
A thin, flat margin on every piece — just enough to keep the store running. Most of what you pay is the print itself. We only sell sizes that reproduce at full quality, and we don’t mark up the large sizes the way most shops do.
About this work
The demurely dressed subject of Mère Grégoire was inspired by the lead character in a popular song written in the 1820s by French lyricist Pierre-Jean de Béranger. Béranger often penned ribald lyrics; his “Madame Grégoire” was the proprietor of a house of prostitution. Gustave Courbet began this work in 1855 as a simple head on a horizontal canvas, but enlarged it to its present dimensions and transformed it into an elaborate genre scene between 1857 and 1859. The artist depicted the woman here in the midst of a transaction, with coins scattered on a marble-topped counter and a ledger beneath her right hand. Under her other hand is the small bell used to summon her female employees. She holds a flower, a symbol of love, which she presumably offers to an unseen customer on the other side of the counter.
The painting may also have had a political subtext. Béranger was a fierce opponent of the monarchy, while Courbet followed in his footsteps as a dissident of the Second Empire. In the mid-1850s, when Courbet began this painting, the government had harshly attacked Béranger’s songs in an eff ort to restrict free expression. Courbet’s decision to portray the songwriter’s Madame Grégoire—whose flower exhibits the blue, white, and red of the French flag—may represent a protest not only against government censorship but also against the Second Empire itself. Thus the artist transformed the character into a heroine who embodies the rights to freedom in life and love that were forbidden under the repressive regime.
Courbet played a crucial role in the development of modern French painting as the leader of the Realist movement, which rejected Romanticism’s dramatic subjects and emotions in favor of portraying everyday people and events with truth and accuracy, warts and all. Critics and the public did not easily accept his large, naturalistic, and unsentimental depictions of commonplace, often rural subjects, earning him the nickname the “apostle of ugliness.”
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 129 × 97.5 cm (50 3/4 × 38 3/8 in.)
Museum record · 4 owners · 12 exhibitions
Provenance
- Possession of the artist; stolen between 1872–73; found by Étienne Baudry at an art dealer in Paris, 1873.
- Galerie Barbzanges, Paris, by 1912.
- Possibly Alexandre Louis Philippe Marie Berthier, 4th Prince of Wagram (died 1918), Paris; possibly at his death to his sister, Elisabeth de la Tour d’Auvergne (née Elisabeth Bertier de Wagram), Paris (according to Art Institute of Chicago 1961 and Fernier 1977).
- Alex Reid & Lefèvre, Ltd., London, by 1929; purchased by the Art Institute, 1929; accessioned 1930.
Exhibitions
- Paris, Rond-Point de l’Alma, Exposition des œuvres de M. G. Courbet, 1867.
- Saint-Petersburg, Exposition centennale de l’art français à Saint-Petersbourg, 1912.
- Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress: Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, June 1–November 1, 1933.
- Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress: Exhibition of Paintings and Sculpture, June 1–November 1, 1934.
- Hartford, Connecticut, Wadsworth Atheneum, 43 Portraits, January 26–February 10, 1937.
- Toledo Museum of Art, The Spirit of Modern France: An Essay on Painting in Society, 1745–1946, November–December 1946; traveled to Toronto, Art Gallery of Ontario, January–February 1947.
- Paris, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Gustave Courbet (1819–1877), September 30, 1977–January 2, 1978; traveled to London, Royal Academy of Art, January 18–March 19, 1978.
- Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, European Portraits, 1600–1900 in the Art Institute of Chicago, July 8–September 11, 1978.
- New York, Brooklyn Museum, Courbet Reconsidered, November 4, 1988–January 16, 1989; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, February 18–April 30, 1989.
- Munich, Haus der Kunst, Corot, Courbet und die Maler von Barbizon: Les amis de la nature, cat. B 34, February 2–April 21, 1996.
- Paris, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Gustave Courbet, October 13, 2007–January 28, 2008; traveled to New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, February 27–May 18, 2008; Montpellier, Musée Fabre, June 14–September 28, 2008.
- Paris, Musée d'Orsay, Splendour and Misery, Images of prostitution in France, 1850-1910 September 21, 2015-June 19, 2016; Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, same exhibition but title " Easy Virtue. Prostitution in French Art, 1850-1910, February 19, 2016-June 19, 2016. Treviso, Museo di Santa Caterina, Storie dell'Impressionismo, October 29, 2016-April 17, 2017.
