Barbizon << BAHR buh zon, >> School, was the name of a group of French painters who settled in the village of Barbizon during the 1830’s and 1840’s. The village is about 35 miles (56 kilometers) south of Paris, near the forest of Fontainebleau.
The Barbizon painters had a strong feeling for the beauty of the simple aspects of nature. They avoided the panoramic views featured in earlier landscape painting, and portrayed scenes of forest glades, pastures, and peasants working in fields. The group admired the Dutch landscape painters of the 1600’s and, like them, tried to create a mood of gentle beauty through the use of partial lighting and muted colors.
The principal Barbizon artists were Theodore Rousseau and Jean Francois Millet. The landscape painter Camille Corot did not live in Barbizon, but he was a friend of many in the group, and his art resembles theirs in many ways.
See also Corot, Camille ; Millet, Jean Francois .
