GREUZE, JEAN BAPTISTE, a celebrated French painter, was born at Tournue in Burgundy in 1726. He was first instructed by Landon at Lyon ; he studied also in the Royal Academy at Paris, and later at Rome. Nearly all Greuze's pictures are illustrations of the affections or domestic duties : he painted but one historical piece ' Severue reprimanding his Son Caracalla : ' portraits he painted frequently. Greuze is unique in the French school, and he is some times termed the Lachausee of Painting, and also less appropriately, the French Hogarth. He was fond of exciting and pathetic scenes; the following are some of his most celebrated pictures :—A Father explaining the Bible to his Family ; The Blind Man Cheated ; The Good Mother ; The Paralytic Father ; The Unnatural Father ; The Village Bride ; The Huntsman's Return ; The Broken Pitcher; The Little Girl and the Dog, ' La Petite Fille an Chien,' by some considered his best picture ; ]'Enfant au Capucin;' 'La Dame de Charite ;" Le Gateau des Reis ; "La Fille Honteuse; "La Bonne Education ;" La Paix do Manage; " La Priam h 1' Amour; ' ' Le Fils Puni,' &c. Ste., all of which have been engraved, and many by J. J. Elipart and the elder Mansard; ' La Petite File an Chien,' has been engraved by Ch. Porporati. But he also painted many figures and portraits of ladies in a semi-nude and very mere tricious style.
Grenze was long an associate or agree of the French academy of painting, but as Ile was placed in the class of genre (du genre has) painters, when be was elected a member, he considered it an indignity, and he retired altogether from the academy. He died March 21, 1805.
There are several pictures by Greuze in the Louvre—among them two of his most celebrated works, The Broken Pitcher ; The Village Bride, ' L' Accordde du Village,' which was purchased for the royal collection at the sale of the Marquis de Meiners for 16,650 francs. In the National Gallery London there is a ' Head of a Girl,' by him. Greuze's pictures are very popular with collectors, and very large sums are paid for them ; yet he cannot be considered a great painter. His works have much truth of character, but not only nearly all his subjects are chosen from common life, there is something generally theatrical and meretricious in his treatment. They are however better as illnatrations of character than as paintings; his drawings, at least the contours, are generally correct and vigorous, but the intermediate modelling, except in the head, is feeble : he was deficient in light and shade and colour, and his draperies want character, or indeed common truth : his beads are well modelled but generally extravagant in expression.