Pierre-Auguste Cot

Pierre-Auguste Cot was a French painter known for graceful, romantic scenes in a polished academic style. Born in 1837, he trained under leading masters and became popular for idealized images of young love and figures from myth and literature. His two most famous paintings, showing couples caught up in a storm and on a swing, are charming, sentimental works that have remained widely loved.

He was a successful and admired portraitist and subject painter in his day. His smooth technique and appealing subjects made his best known pictures enduring favorites, even as fashions in art moved on. Cot is remembered for the tender charm and technical polish of his most popular romantic scenes.