The Storm (L'Orage) by Bouguereau

The Storm (L'Orage) by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, 1874, is an oil painting on canvas of two young girls huddling in fear of dark clouds on a stormy beach landscape. While ocean waves pound the seashore and wind whips at their classical dresses and robes, the two young women turn to the viewer in sympathy and trepidation. Bouguereau’s classical academic painting technique creates a powerful image of fear in the face of the forces of nature. William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825 - 1905) was a French painter who trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris, and the Villa Medici in Rome. He exhibited with great success in the French Salon and became one of most renowned and wealthy artists of his era. Bouguereau worked in the French Academic tradition, a school of late 19th century modern painters who concentrated on the human figure and classical subjects in highly polished works of optical realism. His main interest was the female figure, usually rendered in classical, finely drawn contours, in subjects that were often sentimental. Bouguereau's reputation diminished greatly in the 20th century with the rise of modern art, but interest in his traditional figurative paintings has surged again in recent years.