An official career

On his return from Rome, the painter concentrated temporarily on naturalism, as revealed by the portrait of Joseph Tournois, the son of a sculptor friend (1865, Salon) and Reclining Lady, known as The Lady on a Black Sofa (1869 Salon), now in the Museum of Fine Arts in Mulhouse. Influenced by Manet and Degas, he exhibited La Toilette in 1868 but subsequently destroyed it because of unfavourable criticism.
Henner gradually abandoned this naturalistic style and turned his attention to subjects that did not belong to the contemporary world but were taken from an ideal Antiquity, without reference to a precise period. This style is reflected in the titles of his paintings evoking bucolic poems from antique literature, such as Idyll and Eclogues, exhibited in 1872 and 1879, or mythology, such as Byblis and Naiad.
From the 1870s onwards, the painter became a successful artist and a popular portraitist. Elected a Member of the Institut de France in 1889, he was awarded the highest rank of the Order of the Legion of Honour in 1903,
He regularly submitted to the Salons and Universal Exhibitions historical or religious paintings that fell under the category of the “grand genre”, an example being Saint Sebastian, exhibited at the Salon in 1888. He received few commissions, with the exception of Truth for the Sorbonne but most of his works were purchased by the French State for display in the Luxembourg Museum, dedicated at that time to living artists, or in major regional museums. He was also sought after by private collectors, including Alfred Chauchard, who owned his Reader as well as Millet’s Angelus, both paintings now in the Musée d’Orsay.