Jacques Reatu, “Le Vision de Jacob (Jacob’s Dream)”, Oil on Canvas, 1792, Museum Reattu, Arles, France

Jacques Réattu was a French painter and winner of the grand prix de Rome. He was an illegitimate son of the painter Guillaume de Barrême de Châteaufort and Catherine Raspal, sister of the Arles-born painter Antoine Raspal – Antoine gave him his first lessons in painting.

In Paris, in 1773 he was a pupil of Jean-Antoine Julien, then entered the Academy in 1781, with Michel Francois Dandre-Bardon as a patron, he was a pupil of Jean-Baptiste Regnault. In 1790 he won the Prix de Rome, thanks to a work, currently exhibited at the National School of Fine Arts: Daniel faisant arrêter les vieillards accusateurs de la chaste Suzanne. Following anti-French riots of the Roman population, he fled to Naples, from where he could return to France.