The Young Bather  1866

by Gustave Courbet

The traditional theme of women bathing attracted Courbet’s attention repeatedly in the 1860s. This scene revisits a motif that excited a furor of controversy when the artist first broached it a decade earlier: a realistically fleshy nude enjoying herself at a woodland spring. But by the time the present work was exhibited, viewers were more accepting of Courbet’s approach....
Credit: 
Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art