Public collection via the Cleveland Museum of Art
AT-00000257The Troubadour
About the Artwork
The troubadour, a medieval traveling poet and entertainer, was a popular subject in 19th-century French art. Associated with chivalry and courtly love, the theme reflects a broader, romantic fascination with France's medieval past. Although Daumier was particularly inspired by the troubadour paintings of French Rococo artist Jean-Antoine Watteau of the 1700s, he rendered the subject here in a powerful style of simplified, muscular form that appealed to modern artists of his own time.
Inscriptions
Signed in lower right: h.D. [reinforced]
Provenance
Until 1896: Count Armand Doria [1824-1896] Orrouy, France 1899: (Armand Doria sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, May 4-5, 1899 (no. 132), sold to Ambroise Vollard) 1899-by 1912: (Ambroise Vollard, Paris, sold to Paul Cassirer) 1912 - probably by 1915: (Paul Cassirer, Berlin) By 1928-1940: Eduard Fuchs [1870-1940], Berlin-Zehlendorf, by descent to his wife, Margaret Fuchs 1940-1953: Margaret Fuchs, Paris and New York, consigned to Justin K. Thannhauser 1953: (Justin K. Thannhauser, New York, sold to Leonard C. Hanna, Jr.) 1953-1958: Leonard C. Hanna Jr., [1889-1957], Cleveland, OH, bequeathed to the Cleveland Museum of Art 1958-: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Exhibition history
Paintings and Drawings of Daumier. Tate Britain, London (June 14-July 30, 1961). Honoré Daumier, 1808-1879. National Gallery of Art, Landover, MD (organizer) (September 23-November 25, 1979). Honoré Daumier. National Gallery of Canada (organizer) (June 3-September 6, 1999); Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, France (October 5, 1999-January 3, 2000); The Phillips Collection (February 19-May 14, 2000).
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 7, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
- Date
- 1868–73
- Medium
- oil on fabric
- Dimensions
- Framed: 99.5 x 73 x 8 cm (39 3/16 x 28 3/4 x 3 1/8 in.); Unframed: 83.6 x 56.8 cm (32 15/16 x 22 3/8 in.)
- Type
- Painting
- Classification
- Painting
- Department
- Modern European Painting and Sculpture
- Credit line
- Bequest of Leonard C. Hanna Jr.
- Accession no.
- 1958.23
More by Honoré Daumier in museum collections
Open-access museum record · AT-00000257
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