Figure 1.--This painting variously entitled 'Before the teacher arrives' and Class prangsters' was painted by Auguste Joseph Truphème. We are not sure when it was painted. We see some listings as 1898. We are not sure about that date because that was the year Truphème died. I could have been painted earlier. Several boys are wearing smocks, but there is no unifor color and the smocks appear to be optional. Only about half of the boys are wearing them. < /i>

Auguste Joseph Truphème was born in Aix-en-Provence (1836). We have been unable to find much information on him. He studied under William Bouguereau, Hippolyte Flandrin, and Jean-Jacques Henner. He exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français beginning (1865). He was primarily a genre artist, but seems to have attracted little interest. We find him very interesting as he seems to have specialized in school scenes. Which provides us 19th century images of French schools. The French Third Republic introduced smocks in French schools th help democratize education (1870s). We do not, however, see many boys wearing them in his paintings. We was a popular artist in his era and his paintings were widely reproduced in the press of the time, done as engravings as this was before lithography had made major advances. A lot of his works were reproduced in the Le Petit Journal illustré. He was the younger brother of the sculptor François Truphème (1820-1888). He oversaw the advanced drawing course at the City of Paris. He died in Paris (1898).

Created: 9:48 PM 7/15/2025
Last updated: 9:48 PM 7/15/2025