Constant Troyon

Le Berger et la Mer (The Shepherd and the Sea), 19th Century French Landscape

c. 1840

Constant Troyon (French, 1810 - 1865) was born August 28, 1810 in Sevres, France, where both of his parents were employed in The Sevres Porcelain Factory. He was trained by Riocreux, who was in charge of the porcelain museum at the factory, and worked as a painter on porcelain. He drew and painted from nature in his spare time. His work was featured in the Salon several times as he continued to work as a porcelain decorator. He painted with Jules Dupre in 1843, which was the same year he met Rousseau and went to work in Barbizon, where he received his academic training in landscape painting. He began to paint domestic animals in his work after a visit to Holland, where he was inspired by the work of Cuyp and Potter and became well-known for his animal paintings. He gained an international reputation with through many exhibitions of his work, which were held in collections abroad, and are now in the collections of the following famous museums: Louvre, Paris; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; Metropolitan Museum, New York; and Ermitage in Saint Petersburg. In his last years he painted seascapes on the Normandy coast, which was the same time Boudin worked for him. Constant Troyon died March 20, 1865 in Paris at the age of fifty-five.