Artwork
Puits du Chateau de Nantes, Bretagne

Puits du Chateau de Nantes, Bretagne is an ink print by the Romanticist artist Adrien Dauzats. It dates from 1846 and is held in the collection of the National Gallery of Art.
About this work
The painting shows a scene of a well in the castle of Nantes, Bretagne.
It's a detailed view of the well and its surroundings.
This work is interesting because it gives us a glimpse of what the castle looked like in the 19th century.
To learn more about the process used to create this image, look up the technique: lithography.
Overview
Created in 1846, this lithographic print on chine collé portrays the well situated within the Château de Nantes in the Brittany region of France.
Created in 1846, this lithographic print on chine collé portrays the well situated within the Château de Nantes in the Brittany region of France. The work is attributed to Adrien Dauzaux, a French painter noted for his landscape and genre scenes, particularly those produced during his travels in the Ottoman Empire. The image serves as a precise visual record of a specific architectural element of the castle as it appeared in the mid‑nineteenth century.
Subject & Meaning
The composition focuses tightly on the stone well and its immediate surroundings, emphasizing the texture of the masonry and the play of light across the water’s surface. By isolating this functional feature, the print highlights everyday aspects of historic architecture, offering viewers insight into the utilitarian spaces that supported life within the château’s broader complex.
Technique & Style
Executed as a lithograph transferred onto a thin paper support (chine collé), the work demonstrates the fine line work and tonal gradations characteristic of mid‑1800s French printmaking. The technique allowed Dauzaux to capture intricate details of stonework and water while maintaining a relatively flat, documentary quality, aligning with his broader practice of rendering architectural and scenic subjects with precision.
History & Provenance
The print emerged during a period when Dauzaux was actively documenting sites across Europe and the Near East. While the original drawing’s ownership history is not extensively recorded, the lithograph has been catalogued among his French landscape series, indicating its circulation among collectors interested in topographical prints of historic sites during the nineteenth century.
Artist & collection
Artist
Adrien Dauzats (16 July 1804 – 18 February 1868) was a French landscape, genre painter and painter of Oriental subject matter.



















