Amsterdam born Jacques François Joseph Carabain painted romantic city and village scenes, landscapes and river views. He was educated at the Amsterdam academy of art, where one of his teachers was the figure and history painter Valentijn Bing. This can be traced in the way in which he placed figures in his paintings with great care and with attention to detail. Carabain enjoyed travelling, visiting Italy, France, Austria and Germany on several occasions and painting coastal views of Italy and the South of France. Around 1880 he settled in Brussels, where he lived and worked until his death.