Julien Vallou de Villeneuve

Who was Julien Vallou de Villeneuve?

Julien Vallou de Villeneuve was a French painter, lithographer and photographer.

Vallou de Villeneuve studied with Jean-François Millet, and started his career at the Salon of 1814, exhibiting images depicting daily life, fashion, regional costumes and nude photographs. In the 1820s and 30s he developed an international following for his folio-sized lithographic erotic series Les Jeunes Femmes, depicting racy episodes in the life of young women and their lovers.

From 1842 Villeneuve took up the camera, producing softly toned salted paper prints from paper negatives of the same subject matter. He moved to Paris in 1850, founding the Société française de photographie in 1854. He was also a member of the Société héliographique. Realist painter Gustave Courbet was introduced to his photographs by fellow artist Alfred Bruyas during the 1850s and used them as source material for his paintings, in particular L'Atelier and Les Baigneuses. No photographs by him after 1855 are recorded.

Vallou de Villeneuve is buried at Père Lachaise Cemetery