Bouguereau's youth you might say ended at just about that point in time when photography was being invented. Color photos, much the less, movies, radio, VCRs, DVDs and the Internet were not yet even a remote shadow on the consciousness of the most creative, educated and aware of the scientific and artistic minds of his day. Indeed, there was no more advanced way to depict humanity and to impact ideas values and beliefs than the fine arts of painting and sculpture.

His work was in fact the "state of the art" as well as the finest of art.

And nobody alive could paint children and childhood, and the vast array of subtle thoughts and feelings often caught in fleeting glances, tender and innocent moments, or pensive and troubled expressions that one finds in a richness and depth in Bouguereau's work...unequalled yet in any time.