''The Village Bride'' () is a painting by the French artist

Jean-Baptiste Greuze Jean-Baptiste Greuze (, 21 August 1725 – 4 March 1805) was a French painter of portraits, genre scenes, and history painting. Biography Early life Greuze was born at Tournus, a market town in Burgundy. He is generally said to have formed h ...

, created in 1761. It is now in the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

, in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. The work was first exhibited at the 1761 Salon, where it was unanimously praised by the critics, notably by Diderot. It was the first example of the 'moral painting' genre, to which Greuze often returned. It was part of a series of 6 paintings. Caroline de Valory, a former pupil of Greuze, collaborated with the writer Alexandre Louis Bertrand Robineau to produce ''L'Accordée de Village'', a one-act comedy based on the paintings.

Bibliography

*Denis Diderot, ''Salon de 1765'', Hermann, Paris, 1984 *Denis Diderot, ''Héros et martyrs'', Hermann, Paris, 1995 *Denis Diderot, ''Essais sur la peinture, Salons de 1759, 1761, 1763'', Hermann, Paris, 2007 *Edgar Munhall, ''Jean-Baptiste Greuze 1728–1805'', catalogue of an exhibition at the

Wadsworth Atheneum The Wadsworth Atheneum is an art museum in Hartford, Connecticut. The Wadsworth is noted for its collections of European Baroque art, ancient Egyptian and Classical bronzes, French and American Impressionist paintings, Hudson River School lands ...

, Hartford, 1977 {{DEFAULTSORT:Village Bride, The Paintings in the Louvre by French artists 1761 paintings Paintings by Jean-Baptiste Greuze Genre paintings