Antique

Gustave Caillebotte, French, 1848-1894, Paris Street; Rainy Day, 1877

Gustave Caillebotte, whose personal works were forgotten until recently, was all together a recognized painter and a generous patron of the Impressionist movement.

He was born in 1848 in a very rich family which made its fortune in textiles industry then in real estate business as Baron Haussmann was rebuilding Paris.

Engineer by profession, but also former student of the Fine Arts School of Paris where he studied with Léon Bonnat, he met Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, and Pierre Auguste Renoir in 1874 and helped them organize their 1st group exhibition in Paris this same year.

In 1875, as he wishes to make his public beginnings as a painter, he submitted a work to the Official Salon which was refused, thus encouraging him to exhibit in 1876, with the aid of Renoir, at the second exhibition of the Impressionist group. His works and in particular the "The floor scrapers " were noticed and appreciated. Consequently he will take part in the subsequent exhibitions of the Impressionist Group.