Attributes of Music

François Bonvin (French, 1817–1887)

1863

Medium
oil on fabric
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
Unframed: 62.6 x 116 cm (24 5/8 x 45 11/16 in.)
Culture
France, 19th century
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art, Modern European Painting and Sculpture
Credit line
Bequest of Noah L. Butkin
Rights
Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it
Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed

View at the Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

A lute and flute rest on top of sheet music. This painting was intended to hang above a door, opposite still lifes that represented the other fine arts of painting and sculpture (the two related paintings are in the Musée du Louvre, Paris). Bonvin was part of the 19th-century movement known as Realism. Led by Gustave Courbet (1819-1877), the Realist painters were interested in depicting the world that surrounded them, as well as the popular culture of their time.