Gustave Courbet
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The Stone Breakers by Gustave Courbet, 1849
The original doesn't exist anymore — it was destroyed when Dresden was bombed near the end of the Second World War, so from what I can find, reproductions like this are all that's left of it. Apparently it caused a stir at the time too: painting road workers at the kind of size usually saved for kings and battles wasn't the done thing.
Erisava: Everything in this looks dusty — even the light feels tired.
The Wheat Sifters by Gustave Courbet, 1854
He painted this back in his hometown, and the two women are said to be his sisters. Farm work, done at a size usually saved for kings and battles — apparently that's exactly what annoyed people about him at the time.
Erisava: It's a giant painting of a chore. I can't decide if that's trying to say somethng.
The Meeting, or Bonjour, Monsieur Courbet! by Gustave Courbet, 1854
The man in the middle bankrolled him for years, and the meeting on the road is meant to be the two of them running into each other outside Montpellier, or so the story goes. Critics at the time thought it was outrageously vain and took to calling it 'Fortune bowing to Genius'. The pose itself is said to be lifted from a cheap popular print.
Erisava: They're all standing so still it looks like a photo someone asked them to hold.
A Burial at Ornans by Gustave Courbet, 1841
The row, from what I've read, was about the size. A canvas this wide was for battles and saints, and he used one on a burial in the small town he came from, with half the place turning out for it. When it went on show in Paris it caused an uproar and made his name in one go.
Erisava: It's all blacks and browns, even the sky. Nothing here is trying to look nice.