![Image: In the Forest of Fontainebleau: Painters and Photographers from Corot to Monet](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20080917064950im_/http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2008/fontainebleau/images/fontainebleauinfo.gif)
This exhibition is no longer on view at the National Gallery. Please follow the links below for related online resources or visit our current exhibitions schedule.
![Image: Augustin Enfantin (1793 - 1827) An Artist Painting in the Forest of Fontainebleau, c. 1825 oil on paper mounted on canvas Private Collection](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/eot2008/20080917064950im_/http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2008/fontainebleau/fontainebleu.jpg)
More than 100 works by artists such as Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796–1875), Théodore Rousseau (1812–1867), Jean-François Millet (1814–1875), Claude Monet (1840–1926), Gustave Le Gray (1820–1884), and Eugène Cuvelier (1837–1900) explore the French phenomenon of plein-air (open-air) painting and photography in the region of Fontainebleau, a pilgrimage site for aspiring landscape artists. Some 35 miles southeast of Paris, the Forest of Fontainebleau became a magnet for artists and tourists in the 19th century. It was accessible, beautiful, and visually compelling, with a rare mix of traditional rural French villages and natural landscape features, including magnificent old-growth trees, stark plateaus, dramatic rock formations, and stone quarries. Best known for the informal artists’ colony centered in the village of Barbizon, the Forest of Fontainebleau became a nearly obligatory stop for both French and foreign artists, and served as subject and sanctuary, "natural studio" and open-air laboratory for investigating nature. Spanning half a century, from the mid-1820s through the 1870s, this artistic movement gave rise to the Barbizon School of painting and laid the groundwork for impressionism. The forest also inspired a new school of landscape photography, as figures such as Gustave Le Gray and Eugène Cuvelier, working side by side with painters, explored the camera’s potential to reveal nature in a fresh and unadorned manner. The exhibition also includes 19th-century artists' equipment and tourist ephemera.
Organization: Organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, in association with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
Sponsor: The exhibition is made possible by The Florence Gould Foundation.
The exhibition is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.
Schedule: National Gallery of Art, Washington, March 2–June 8, 2008;
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, July 13–October 19, 2008