The Source
Artist: Gustave Courbet (French, 1819–1877)
Original Dimensions: 47 1/4" x 29 1/4"
Location: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
About Artwork: (1862) "Rejecting the convention of showing an idealized, statuesque female figure based on classical models, in this work Courbet dropped the trappings of an academic allegory or, indeed, of a picture with a high-minded pretext. His picture of a woman embracing a cascade of water may have been a response to a work by Ingres exhibited in Paris the previous year, which depicts a hyper-idealized nude holding a jar from which water pours as an allusion to spring or a river source." - (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)

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