Jean-François Millet (Antwerp 1642 - Paris 1679)

Jean-François Millet, born in Antwerp in 1642, was one of the leading Flemish landscape artists working in France in the middle of the 17th century. He spent most of his life in Paris, where he lived with his brother Pierre, also a painter. There he studied under Genoels, specializing in landscapes and vedute. The majority of his work consists in small or medium-size paintings in which the landscape dominates over the religious or mythological scenes unfolding there. In 1673 he became a member of the Paris academy of painting, one of France’s leading artistic institutions.
Although there is no documentation that Millet visited Rome, his art reflects the “classical” style in vogue at the time in Italy, particularly in Rome and in the region of Emilia. The influence of mid-17th-century French and Flemish landscapes and of the works of Nicolas Poussin, Sebastien Bourdon and Gaspard Dughet helped Millet to develop his own original style. He died in Paris in 1679.