Andalusian Muleteer In Front Of A Ruin, Oil On Wood By Edouard Castres, 1886

After studying with Barthélemy Menn in his hometown, he went to Paris to take courses at the School of Fine Arts. He took part in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 in the Army of the East as a volunteer for the French Red Cross and attended the army's retreat to Switzerland in February 1871. In memory of this event, he painted several oil paintings depicting the daily life of these soldiers in the snowy Jura. His work was noticed by the entrepreneur Benjamin Henneberg, who commissioned Castres to create a 40-metre circular panorama depicting the surrender of General Bourbaki's army. He began his studies on the subject in 1876 and completed the painting in Geneva in four years from 1881 with a team of painters including Ferdinand Hodler. The Bourbaki panorama, measuring 112 metres by 10 metres, is exhibited in Lucerne in a specially dedicated museum. In contrast to its panorama, our work is almost a miniature. It is signed and dated: EC 86