He was born in La Rochelle. After leaving school he studied for some years under Louis Cabat , the landscape painter. Fromentin was one of the earliest pictorial interpreters of Algeria , having been able, while quite young, to visit the land and people that suggested the subjects of most of his works, and to store his memory as well as his portfolio with the picturesque and characteristic details of North African life.
His first great success was produced at the Salon of , by the Gorges de la Chiffa. In , he was awarded a medal of the second class. In , he paid a second visit to Algeria, accompanying an archaeological mission, and then completed that minute study of the scenery of the country and of the habits of its people which enabled him to give to his after-work the realistic accuracy that comes from intimate knowledge.
He is also one of the first "art critics" to approach the subject of The Old Masters from a personal point of view โ being a painter himself.
He also puts the work in a social, political and economic context, as the Dutch Golden Age painting develops shortly after Holland won its independence.
Bernhard Berenson wrote of the book, "I carry Fromentin with me, and read him each evening about the pictures I have seen that he criticizes.
