Jean-Baptiste Greuze was a French painter of portraits, genre scenes, and historical subjects. Born in Tournus in 1725, he studied art in Lyons and then in Paris with Charles Joseph Natoire. Greuze's early work was heavily influenced by the Baroque style of Natoire and other French Rococo painters. However, in the mid-1750s, he began to paint sentimental scenes of everyday life that were infused with moralizing messages. These works became hugely popular and brought Greuze considerable fame and success.

Greuze's style was characterized by a graceful line and soft colors, and his paintings often featured young women and children in intimate domestic settings. He was a member of the French Royal Academy, and his work was widely exhibited in France and abroad. Despite his success, however, Greuze fell out of favor with critics and collectors in the late 18th century, as the neoclassical style began to dominate French art. He died in 1805, largely forgotten, but his sentimental genre scenes would later influence the work of 19th-century painters such as Jean-Francois Millet and Gustave Courbet.