Jean-François Raffaëlli

Jean-François Raffaëlli tried his hand at just about every kind of artistic expression. When he was eighteen years old, he sang in theaters and churches. After enrolling as a volunteer during the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), he returned to the theater for a short time. Painter, sculptor, printmaker, and illustrator, he was equally competent in the practice of each of these different techniques, but painting remained his true passion. He was listed as a student in Gérôme's (q.v) workshop but spent most of his time in the Louvre studying the Old Masters. He began exhibiting his paintings...