As a boy his strong desires led his parents to place him, after some preliminary teaching from a passing Italian artist, in a free school of art directed by M. Constantin, a landscape painter of some reputation.

[1] Whilst a lad he had, at Aix, made the acquaintance of the young comte de Forbin, and upon his invitation Granet, in the year 1797, went to Paris.

In the changing lights and shadows of the corridors of the Capuchins, Granet found the materials for that one picture to the painting of which, with varying success, he devoted his life.

He became a member of the institute in 1830; but in spite of these honours, and the ties which bound him to M. de Forbin, then director of the Louvre, Granet constantly returned to Rome.

He bequeathed the greater part of his fortune to his native town and all his collections (including the very fine portrait by Ingres from 1811[citation needed] ) to the Museum of Aix en Provence,[2] which was renamed the Musée Granet in 1949, the centenary of his death.