Title: Grotto of Sarrazine

Artist: Gustave Courbet

The Grotto of Sarrazine near Nans-sous-Sainte-Anne About 1864 Gustave Courbet French, Ornans 1819–La Tour-de-Peilz 1877 Oil on canvas Courbet painted the grotto of Sarrazine, a popular tourist destination in his native region, numerous times in 1864. In this visually dramatic picture, he proposed radical new ideas about composition and technique. The cave fills the vortex-like composition, underscoring the mineral-rich, craggy, and moss-covered surfaces that engulf the viewer. Courbet used brushes and palette knives to create a laboriously constructed surface that evokes the variegated colors and textures of the rock strata. Staggering in its modernity, the painting verges on abstraction.