Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-875) was the leading figure of the Barbizon school in France in the mid-nineteenth century and a pivotal figure in landscape painting. This volume - from the series dedicated to drawings in the Louvre, which also holds the largest collections of drawings by Corot - examines the principal artistic phases of Corot, who considered drawing the very essence of art. Drawings, sketchbooks and autograph letters enable the reader to follow Corot in his numerous journeys to Italy and within France, and reveal the development and richness of his style, from the precise, vigorous lines of his early studies to those of his mature style, executed in pencil and pen, and on to the velvety, deep blacks of his late charcoal works.Landscapes drawn 'in situ' or recomposed from memory, monuments, portraits and nudes are presented in the exhibition which, through a selection of his 'cliches verre', also highlights Corot's fundamental importance in the field of 19th-century print-making.

Arlette Serullaz is General Curator of the Graphic Arts Department of the Louvre. She has been the Director of the Musee Delacroix of Paris since 1984. She is the author of numerous publications including 'David: Drawing Gallery' (5 Continents 2006), 'Delacroix: Drawing Gallery' (5 Continents 2005), and 'Delacroix: The Late Work' (Thames & Hudson 1998).