Christina’s Reviews > Keeping an Eye Open: Essays on Art > Status Update

'Courbet—who was born in Ornans in 1819, came to Paris at the age of twenty and had his first picture accepted by the Salon five years later—created, or adapted to his use, the persona of the boisterous, belligerent, subversive, shit-kicking provincial; then, like some contemporary TV personality, he found that this public image had become indistinguishable from his true nature.'