Adolphe–Félix Cals was born into a poor family, yet his parents attempted to prevent him from performing manual labor.

After Anselin died suddenly he went on studying engraving, first with Ponce, then under Bosc, before finally entering the atelier of Léon Cogniet.

In 1863, Cals exhibited at the "Salon des Refusés," alongside works by Monet, Degas, and Pissarro.

So began the next phase of his career; influenced by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and Johan Barthold Jongkind, he worked in more subdued, less fawn-colored tones, more closely matching the Impressionists without adopting the "purple-violet which some painters are flooding their paintings with"—as Victor Jannesson remarked in his book on Cals (see bibliography).

[1] A friend of Jongkind, Cals regularly visited an inn in Honfleur called the Saint-Siméon Farm, a famous meeting place for artists and writers, such as Claude Monet, Eugène Boudin, and Baudelaire, as well as Jongkind himself.