{
"data": {
"id": 150077,
"accession_number": "1980.282",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Lazarillo de Tormes and His Blind Master, before 1880. Th\u00e9odule Ribot (French, 1823\u20131891). Oil on fabric; framed: 108 x 90 x 7 cm (42 1/2 x 35 7/16 x 2 3/4 in.); unframed: 91.5 x 73.7 cm (36 x 29 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Bequest of Noah L. Butkin, 1980.282",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Lazarillo de Tormes and His Blind Master",
"creation_date": "before 1880",
"creation_date_earliest": 1870,
"creation_date_latest": 1880,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"France, 19th century"
],
"technique": "oil on fabric",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Modern European Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 108 x 90 x 7 cm (42 1/2 x 35 7/16 x 2 3/4 in.); Unframed: 91.5 x 73.7 cm (36 x 29 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 1.08,
"width": 0.9,
"depth": 0.07
},
"unframed": {
"height": 0.915,
"width": 0.737
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Signed lower left: t. Ribot",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 304521,
"title": "Year in Review: 1980",
"description": "Year in Review: 1980. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (June 24-July 19, 1981).",
"opening_date": "1981-06-24T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 207204,
"title": "Manet/Vel\u00e1zquez: The French Taste for Spanish Painting",
"description": "Manet/Vel\u00e1zquez: The French Taste for Spanish Painting. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (organizer) (February 25-June 29, 2003).",
"opening_date": "2003-02-25T00:00:00"
},
{
"id": 396858,
"title": "Th\u00e9odule Ribot (1823-1891): A Delightful Darkness",
"description": "Th\u00e9odule Ribot (1823-1891): A Delightful Darkness. Mus\u00e9e des Augustins, Toulouse, France (October 16, 2021-January 2, 2022) https://www.augustins.org/en/exhibition-theodule-ribot; Mus\u00e9e des Beaux-Arts, Marseille, Marseille, France (February 10-May 15, 2022); Mus\u00e9e des Beaux-Arts de Caen, Caen, France (organizer) (June 11-October 2, 2022) https://mba.caen.fr/exposition/theodule-ribot.",
"opening_date": "2021-10-16T04:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Paris, Galeries de L'Art. Th. Ribot, Exposition G\u00e9n\u00e9rale de ses oeuvres (1880), not in cat. (according to Weisberg 1976).",
"opening_date": "1976-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Paris, Galerie Bernheim Jeune. Exposition T. Ribot (1890), 19, L'aveugle \u00e0 la cruche verte et l'enfant, app. \u00e0 M. Oppenheim; 55, no. 227 bis, L'aveugle, app. \u00e0 M. Oppenheim.",
"opening_date": null
},
{
"description": "Possibly Paris, Bernheim Jeune & Cie. Exposition Ribot (2-8 February 1911), no. 24, L'aveugle.",
"opening_date": "1911-02-02T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "The Metropolitan Museum of Art (2/25/2003 - 6/8/2003): \"Manet/Velazquez: The French Taste for Spanish Painting\", exh. cat. no 198, p.518, fig. 14.80, p. 400.",
"opening_date": "2003-02-25T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "(E. Oppenheim sale, H\u00f4tel Drouot, May 11, 1897, no. 22, unsold",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"\"E. Oppenheim\" may refer to Eduard Freiherr von Oppenheim of the German banking family. Eduard\u2019s brother Albert von Oppenheim was an avid art collector, whereas Eduard was chiefly interested in horse-breeding and horseracing. He did own works of art, but the archives of the Bankhaus Sal. Oppenheim contain no inventory or correspondence indicating that the Ribot was owned by Eduard or that his collection was sold in 1897 at H\u00f4tel Drouot (Gabriele Teichmann, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Jan. 5, 2016). According to H\u00f4tel Drouot's annotated copy of the 1897 sale catalogue , the painting failed to sell. In the catalogue, as well as those of the 1918 and 1973 auctions, the CMA painting is titled \u201cL'aveugle et don Guzman d'Alfarache.\u201d After Ribot\u2019s death, the painting acquired this title (\u201cThe Blind Man and Don Guzman d\u2019Alfaranche\u201d), a reference to Mateo Alem\u00e1n\u2019s novel Guzman de Alfarache (1599). The subject of the painting, however, clearly derives from a passage in the earlier novel Lazarillo de Tormes (1554). The discrepancy between title and subject likely stems from the moralizing plot and happier ending of Guzman d\u2019Alfarache, which was apparently more agreeable and memorable to a wider audience.
"
],
"date": "1897",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Possibly Bernheim-Jeune, Paris)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"A 1911 exhibition of works by Ribot at Bernheim-June includes a painting titled L\u2019Aveugle for which no dimensions or descriptions are provided. The absence of a Bernheim-Jeune stock number on the back of the painting, frame, or stretcher make it difficult to confirm whether or not the CMA picture was the one in the Bernheim-Jeune catalogue.
"
],
"date": "1911",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "(Sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, December 4-5, 1918, no. 8)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1918",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "(H\u00f4tel Drouot, Nov. 7, 1973 [no lot number, reproduced on page 3], sold to Peter Wengraf on behalf of Noah L. and Muriel S. Butkin)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1973",
"sortorder": 4
},
{
"description": "Noah L. [1918-1980] and Muriel S. Butkin [1915-2008], Cleveland, OH, bequeathed to the Cleveland Museum of Art as a result of disclaimer by Muriel S. Butkin",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1973-1980",
"sortorder": 5
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1980-",
"sortorder": 6
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": null,
"description": "The subject of this painting comes from the 16th-century Spanish novel Lazarillo de Tormes. This tells the story of Lazarillo, a poor servant boy who worked for an impoverished blind man. Abused by his master, and never given enough to eat or drink, Lazarillo is forced to fend for himself. According to the story, he steals wine by drinking it from a straw directly from the blind man's jug. This painting relates to a cultural movement known as espagnolisme, the French interest in Spanish art and literature. Especially popular during the 1850s, espagnolisme focused upon realistic, often down-trodden characters such as Lazarillo. Instead of finding them na\u00efve or foolishly humorous, artists such as Ribot related to their alienation from society and found inspiration in the detailed descriptions of their rough, lowly lifestyles.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60474641"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1980.282-lazarillo-de-tormes"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Ho\u0302tel Drouot. Catalogue de tableaux modernes et dessins. May 11, 1897.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Laurence Mille, email to Victoria Sears Goldman, Oct. 27, 2015, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Exposition Ribot. Paris: Bernheim-Jeune, 1911.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "
Galerie Georges Petit. Catalogue des tableaux modernes par Bail, Berche\u0300re, Boudin, Jules Breton, Cazin, Chaplin... Dec. 4-5, 1918.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Ho\u0302tel Drouot. Tableaux anciens et du XIXe sie\u0300cle, objets d'art et d'ameublement, meubles et sie\u0300ges anciens. Nov. 7, 1973.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Peter Wengraf, letter to Mlle. Harranger, Nov. 13, 1977, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Estate of Noah L. Butkin, Bequests to Cleveland Museum of Art as a result of disclaimer by Murel S. Butkin. Estates, Gifts, and Funds, Series 1, Box 2:14. Cleveland Museum of Art Archives.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Peter Wengraf, letter to Mlle. Harranger, Nov. 13, 1977, in CMA curatorial file.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Weisberg, Gabriel P. \u201cTh\u00e9odule Ribot: Popular Imagery and the Little Milkmaid.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 63, no. 8 (October 1976): 253\u2013263.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 258; Reproduced: p. 260, figs16-17",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152657"
},
{
"citation": "Lee, Sherman E. \u201cThe Year in Review for 1980.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 68, no. 6 (June 1981): 163\u2013219.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 177; Mentioned: p. 213, no. 65",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25159730"
},
{
"citation": "Argencourt, Louise d', and Roger Diederen. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 4. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 546-548, Vol. II, no. 192",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Delapierre, Emmanuelle. \"Paysages.\" In The\u0301odule Ribot, 1823-1891: Une De\u0301licieuse Obscurite\u0301. Emmanuelle Delapierre, Luc Georget, Gabriel Weisberg, eds., 182-193. Paris: LienArt, 2021.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 218-219, no. 80",
"url": ""
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1980.282",
"images": {
"annotation": null,
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"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.282/1980.282_web.jpg",
"width": "707",
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"filesize": "368118",
"filename": "1980.282_web.jpg"
},
"print": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.282/1980.282_print.jpg",
"width": "2692",
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"full": {
"url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1980.282/1980.282_full.tif",
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},
"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Bequest of Noah L. Butkin",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
"sketchfab_url": null,
"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 150077,
"creators": [
{
"id": 1582,
"description": "Th\u00e9odule Ribot (French, 1823\u20131891)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "Th\u00e9odule Ribot first tried to study art at the trade school in Ch\u00e2lons, \u00c9cole des Arts et M\u00e9tiers. When his father died in 1840, Ribot had to help support his family. He worked as a bookkeeper in Rouen, married early, and left for Paris in 1845. There he did various jobs, studied in the atelier of Auguste-Barth\u00e9l\u00e9my Glaize (1807-1893), and, in 1848, went to Algeria to work as a foreman for three years. Back in Paris, he befriended the painter Bonvin (q.v.), who held an exhibition of pictures by his friends in his studio in 1859. These artists, including Fantin-Latour (q.v.), Alphonse Legros (1837-1911), Antoine Vollon (1833-1900), and J. A. M. Whistler (1834-1903), depicted ordinary subjects from their immediate environments without relying on narrative, and they generally used somber colors, limited illumination, and broader brushwork that contrasted with academic standards and methods. Their work elicited a positive response from Courbet (q.v.), considered the father of realism in France. Ribot first exhibited at a Paris Salon in 1861, when his kitchen scenes won generally favorable reviews. To underscore a humble life-style for the artist, his early biographers claim that the dark, inky backgrounds of his pictures were the result of Ribot's painting by lamplight in his free evenings at home. He continued to depict working-class and peasant subjects in a style variously described as Dutch or Spanish by critics, and he participated in the Salons and provincial and international art exhibitions. Always interested in expanding exhibition opportunities for independent painters like himself, he signed a petition in 1863 that decried the Salon jury's numerous rejections that year and contributed to the official decision to hold the Salon des Refus\u00e9s. Ribot sold his pictures through art galleries in Paris, such as those of Louis Martinet, Alfred Cadart, and Bernheim Jeune, and the French state bought his St. Sebastian (Mus\u00e9e d'Orsay, Paris) in 1865. In 1878 he was named to the Legion of Honor. The following year a serious illness kept Ribot from painting for two years, and his production fell off after this period. In 1884 his fellow artists, including Jules Bastien-Lepage (1848-1884), Boudin (q.v.), Fantin-Latour, Monet (q.v.), Puvis de Chavannes (q.v.), and Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), held a banquet in his honor and gave him a medal inscribed \"To Th\u00e9odule Ribot, the independent painter.\" It is ironic, then, that the year after his death a major retrospective exhibition was organized at the official art school, the \u00c9cole des Beaux-Arts in Paris.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1823",
"death_year": "1891",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1980-12-19T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1870,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "before 1880",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": true,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-03-27 00:06:08.334000"
}
}