Gustave Courbet

He worked with Corot, Daumier and Manet to get official Salon regulations changed, often lent Monet money, strongly influenced the young Renoir, and corresponded extensively with Hugo. His regular companions and supporters Proudhon and Baudelaire were depicted in his famous allegory of the artist’s studio; these two, Courbet and Daumier frequented a brasserie close to his studio — a regular meeting-place for realist painters and writers. Whistler had been a disciple; the likelihood that his mistress modelled for Courbet’s most shockingly erotic painting may explain the abrupt ending of their friendship.