François Bocion1828–1890Feeding Ducks
Can I see it?
Not on view at present
Where is “Feeding Ducks” now? Collection: Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Not on view at present. Checked September 25, 2026.
London, United Kingdom
It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.
- Checked
- In this state since
- Source
- The museum
About the painting
François Bocion (1828-1890) was born in Lausanne. He first trained with Christian Gottlieb Steinlen (1779-1847) in Vevey and subsequently with François Bonnet (1811-1894) in Lausanne. In Paris in 1845, Bocion entered the atelier of Louis-Aimé Grosclaude (1784-1869) and later that of Charles Gleyre (1806-1874) and befriended Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) and other important exponents of the Realist movement. Back in Lausanne in 1849 he became a teacher at the Ecole moyenne et industrielle of Lausanne, a position he held until his death. At the same time, he had an extensive output with several travels abroad. He exhibited in Paris, Vienna, Anvers, London and was a founder member of the Swiss society of watercolorists (1884).
Read on
This painting presents a genre scene composed of small figures and a house of remarkable architecture, slightly reminiscent of medieval construction. Bocion, who started as a history painter, may therefore have executed this composition fairly early in his career. The rustic subject matter is also characteristic of the Realist and Naturalist approach emerged in the 1840s in France. After the 1850s, Bocion focused on the depiction of scenes by the Lake Leman, which became a recurrent thematic of his oeuvre.
Victoria and Albert Museum
Details
- Accession number
- 1585-1869
What it shows
In the catalog
Sources
- Victoria and Albert Museum
- Image: Victoria and Albert Museum — © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
