Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) is best known as an innovator in Realism (and credited with coining the term), and a landscape and seascape painter. Howver this monograph focuses on the period after 1860 when his work took a decidedly erotic turn. Towards the end of the 1860s, Courbet painted a series of explicitly erotic works, culminating in The Origin of the World (L'Origine du monde) (1866), depicting female genitalia, and The Sleepers (1866), featuring two women in bed. While banned from public display, the works only served to increase his notoriety.