Leon Richet was a respected and well known painter of the Barbizon school. He painted magnificent landscapes of the area around the Forest of Fontainebleau, but he also produced still lifes, and genre studies. He was born in Solesmes, in the Sarthe, in France. He showed an aptitude for drawing at an early age, and initially studied with Ambroise Detrez, who was a Professor at the Academy of Valencienne. 

He went on to study under three great painters, who included Jules Lefebvre, Gustave Boulanger, and Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Pena. Jules Lefebvre was of course a well known academic painter, and Gustave Boulanger a painter of Creole origin who painted in the neoclassical style, and was also an Orientalist, having travelled to Algeria in 1845.

It is probably Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Pena, one of the Masters of the Barbizon school, who had the greatest influence on Richet, as it was Diaz de la Pena who brought him to the Forest of Fontainebleau to paint. The fact that Richet is known as one of the painters of the Barbizon school is without a doubt due to the influence of Diaz de la Pena. The other Master of the Barbizon school that Richet also admired greatly was Theodore Rousseau.

His debut in the Salon was in 1869, with two paintings produced whilst at Fontainebleau which were entitled, ‘Birch Trees on the Hilltops of the Plaine-Blanche, Forest of Fontainebleau,’ and ‘Pond in the Gorge-aux-Loups, Forest of Fontainebleau.’

Richet travelled extensively throughout France, producing landscapes, and also was particularly fond of the Normandy and Picardy regions. In the Salon of 1870, he exhibited a painting produced in Normandy, entitled, ‘Farm in Normandy,’ and also went on to exhibit paintings produced in Picardy.

He was particularly keen on painting water, such as ponds and marshes. His paintings were said to be a precursor to the Impressionists as he was always concerned with the light and atmospheric changes. He paid particular attention to this in his paintings, and especially how the light, and the sky was reflected in the water.

He was successful in the Salon, and won an Honourable Mention in 1885 and a Second Class medal in 1888, for paintings he exhibited of the Forest of Fontainebleau. He also won another Second Class medal in 1901, for a painting of one of his favourite subjects, water, entitled, ‘The Seine River near Moret, Seine-et-Marne’. His last exhibit at the Salon was also of water, with a painting entitled, ‘The Pond-Around Montargis’.

There are collections of Richet’s paintings in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, and the Museums of Nice, and Reims in France.