The Cellist (Self-portrait)

In 1846 and 1847 Courbet traveled through the Netherlands and Belgium and looked hard at Rembrandt and Frans Hals, and came back convinced a painter should show the life around him. Just after, still in his late 20s, he painted himself here as a cellist, bent over the instrument, his face half swallowed by shadow while the bow and hands are pulled forward into the light. He sent it to the Paris Salon of 1848, the year the French monarchy fell again and the country turned back into a republic. Critics standing in front of it noticed at once how close its deep light and shade stood to Rembrandt's own self-portraits. It is one of several pictures from these years in which the young Courbet cast himself in a role, a few years before the plain, unposed scenes that would make his name.