JULES

DUPRE (1812-1889)  , French painter, was one of the chief members of the Barbizon group of romantic landscape painters . If Corot stands for the lyric and Rousseau for the epic aspect of the poetry of nature, Dupre is the exponent of her tragic and dramatic aspects . He was the son of a porcelain manufacturer, and started his career in his father's works, whence he went to his uncle's china factory at Sevres .. After studying for some time under Diebold, a painter of clock faces, he had to pass through a short period of privation, until he attracted the attention of a wealthy patron, who came to his studio and bought all the studies on the walls at the price demanded by the artist—2o francs apiece . Dupre exhibited first at the Salon in 1831, and three years later was awarded a second-class medal . In the same year he came to England, where he was deeply impressed by the genius of Constable . From him he learnt how to express movement in nature; and the district of Southampton and Plymouth, with its wide, unbroken expanses of water, sky and ground, gave him good opportunities for studying the tempestuous motion of storm-clouds and the movement of foliage driven by the wind . He received the cross of the Legion of Honour in 1848 . Dupre's colour is sonorous and resonant; the subjects for which he showed marked preference are dramatic sunset effects and stormy skies and seas . Late in life he changed his style and gained appreciably in largeness of handling and arrived at greater simplicity in his colour harmonies . Among his chief works are the " Morning " and " Evening " at the Louvre, and the early " Crossing the Bridge " in the Wallace Collection .