Ernest Hébert

Ernest Hébert studied at Beaux-Arts de Paris and French Academy in Rome. Training under Benjamin de Rolland, David d'Angers and Paul Delaroche is recorded. Edouard Frederic Wilhelm Richter, Francine Charderon and Eugène Louis Pirodon are recorded as having studied under Ernest Hébert. The recorded working language is French. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are history. Places of work recorded in the authority are France. Employment is recorded with Beaux-Arts de Paris. Positions recorded include director of the French Academy in Rome. Works named in the authority record are Amélie Hébert, mother of the artist, Antonietta and Self-portrait at 17 when he arrived in Paris. Work by Ernest Hébert is recorded in the collections of Art Institute of Chicago, Musée Carnavalet, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la ville de Paris, Walters Art Museum and Philadelphia Museum of Art. Distinctions recorded are Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour and Prix de Rome.

Hébert was born in Grenoble, son of a notary in Grenoble, and moved in 1835 to Paris to study law. He simultaneously took art lessons in the workshops of the sculptor David d'Angers (1788–1856), and also of the history painter Paul Delaroche (1797–1896), but even though he took art lessons he was mostly a selftaught artist. At the age of 22 years he achieved success with his painting Le cup en prison in the Paris Salon. The Académie des Beaux-Arts awarded him the Prix de Rome in 1839 for the biblical composition Joseph's cup in Benjamin's sack. The prize was a scholarship and a long study stay in the Villa Medici in Rome. His painting Mal'aria was exhibited in the Salon of 1850, and now hangs in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris. Painted in a Romantic style, it depicts a family of Italian peasants escaping an epidemic by raft, a scene inspired by events Hébert had witnessed while in Italy. One of Hébert's students Paul Trouillebert was an important artist of the Barbizon School. The artist's house is preserved as the Musée Hébert in the 6th arrondissement of Paris. There is another museum near Grenoble.

• Illustration — Mal'aria (1848–49), Musée d'Orsay, Paris. • Illustration — Attack and capture of the Crête-à-Pierrot, 1839 • Illustration — La Mal'aria, 1848 • Illustration — Louise Lefuel Hochon, Musée Hébert, Paris. • Illustration — Ophélie, Musée Hébert, Paris. • Illustration — Portrait of the writer, Léon Laurent-Pichat • Illustration — Two Odalisques Contemplating the Bosphorus, 1843 • Illustration — Mosaic in the apse of the Panthéon (Paris)