Portrait of Ferdinand Chaigneau (head and hands)

Bouguereau reached Paris in March 1846 with 900 francs, earned by painting 33 portraits in three months around Saintonge. This was made the year after, while he was studying in Francois-Edouard Picot's studio at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. The sitter, Ferdinand Chaigneau, was 17 and came from Bordeaux, where the two of them had trained under the same drawing master, Jean-Paul Alaux. Bouguereau painted him twice in 1847, once as a head alone and once like this, larger, with the hands brought in. The following February revolution ended the monarchy, and the Salon of 1848 opened with no jury at all. Chaigneau sent his first picture to it, a view of the country outside Bordeaux. He spent the rest of his life at Barbizon, painting sheep.