"The new museum artfully traces his vivid path from ambitious provincial to renegade Parisian luminary to the political outcast he became in his final years. It also locates the artist securely within his native locale. One can glimpse from its windows the same chalky, limestone cliffs that Courbet painted with a palette knife and thick slabs of pigment. \\ In the aftermath of the French Commune (1871), the artist fell into disgrace. Implicated in the infamous destruction of the Vendome Column in Paris, Courbet was imprisoned. In the final galleries, Courbet's tragic last chapter is poignantly set forth. His "Self Portrait at St. Pélagie" (c. 1872), one of the true treasures given to Ornans by his sister, Juliette, depicts the artist in prison—emaciated, melancholic but still youthful and sporting the symbolic red scarf of a Communard." http://online.wsj.com/article... - Adriano