Pygmalion and Galatea

Jean-Léon Gérôme is considered among the greatest French academic painters of the 19th century, following in the footsteps of the father of French neo-classical painting, Jacques-Louis David. Born in 1824 into a modest family in Vesoul, Haute-Saône, Gérôme moved to Paris in 1841 and enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in the studio of Paul Delacroche and later that of Charles Gleyre. He debuted at the Salon in 1847 with his genre painting The Cock Fight. The work caught the attention of Théophile Gautier who praised it in an article for La Presse, earning Gérôme instant fame. Gérôme and Gleyre’s other students were subsequently encouraged to work in the same vein, appealing to the critics. This led to the formation of their group “Les Pompiers” (named after the French fire brigade whose members wore Greek-style helmets), also known as “Les Néo-Grecques”, which Gérôme headed.

Paris