Discover the Treasures of French with Decouvertes DMC
Barbizon painters’ village
In 1820, Edmée and François Ganne opened a grocery store in Barbizon. Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot discovered the town in 1827, bringing Théodore Rousseau and Jean-François Millet.
An entire generation of young artists decided to paint “from nature,” leaving their studios to create in situ like their two famous English ancestors, John Constable and Turner.
The museums
The Musée des Peintres de Barbizon is located in two historic places: the auberge Ganne, where numerous painters stayed between 1820 and 1860 to gain inspiration from the surrounding landscape, and Theodore Rousseau’s house-studio, where he lived his last twenty years.
The school’s leaders, Théodore Rousseau and Jean-François Millet, were driven from Paris by poverty and lack of success and settled in Barbizon in 1846 and 1849, respectively. Some landscape and animal painters lived at Barbizon, others visited seldom.
The Auberge Ganne recreates this period’s ambiance with its furnishings and décor. Permanent collections include works by Jean-François Millet, Narcisse Diaz de la Pea, and Rosa Bonheur.