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拍品專文
The romantic subject of the young peasant woman keeping watch over sheep or livestock was a regular leit-motif of Millet's work, and a typical drawing had been illustrated in Sensier's 1881 biography of the artist. Pissarro adopted this motif on numerous occasions, including the Turkey Girl of 1884 (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), and in a series of gouaches dated of 1887 to which the present work and Gardeuse de vaches, Eragny (fig. 1) belong.
Although Pissarro was inspired by Jean-Franois Millet, who by 1880, five years after his death, was universally recognised and much copied, he did not treat his peasants with the same romanticism. In his article about the seventh Impressionist exhibition of 1880s, Octave Mirbeau declared: "Some had reproached Pissarro with imitating Millet, but nothing could be more absurd. Pissarro imitates nothing but nature itself, and he sees it with a very individual eye: gay and beautiful light, limpidly serene transparencies, and along with this very tight, very expert draughtsmandhip in a style that belongs absolutely to him alone" (O. Mirbeau, 'Exposition de Peinture. 1, rue Lafitte', La France, 21 May 1886).
Pissarro had visited the major Millet exhibition in Paris in May of 1887 and sent a note to his son saying, "Millet's drawings are a hundred times better than his paintings which are now dated" (quoted in J. Rewald, Camille Pissarro: Letters to his son Lucien, New York, 1943, p. 110). Fired by this, Pissarro left Paris for Eragny in late May and embarked upon the series of gouaches based on drawings relating to Millet compositions, to which the present work belongs. On 1 June he writes to Lucien, "I finished four gouaches of which two are pretty good, Market of Pontoise (P. & V. 1413) and Cow-Girl of Eragny (P. & V. 1426-27). The two others are so-so ... Impossible to work outdoors; continued thunderstorms. I am working hard at gouaches. I am beginning my large canvas, and continuing my landscape with the hare" (op. cit., p. 114).
The lightness and purity of colour which Pissarro had acquired during his divisionist phase of the mid-decade in oils, was now captured in this series of particularly luminous gouaches. Many of these gouaches are small format and painted on prepared linen (see lot 4), rarer are the large format gouaches executed directly onto paper, of which the present piece is a particularly fine example.
In the late 1880s Pissarro had become frustrated with pure pointillism. The rigours of working with the dot were too restrictive and destroying the sense of artistic spontaneity which lay at the very heart of Impressionism. Just as he was painting the present gouache, Pissarro was describing his new direction to his son, Lucien. In a letter of July 1887 he writes: "How can one combine the purity and simplicity of the dot with the fullness, supleness, liberty, spontaneity and freshness of sensations postulated by our impressionist art? This is the question which preoccupies me, for this dot is meagre, lacking in body, diaphanous, more monotonous than simple, even in the Seurats, particularly in the Seurats...," (as quoted in C. Lloyd, Camille Pissarro, London, 1981, p. 110). The dissatisfaction resulted in a further shift in Pisarro's style. His execution now became more subtle, his colour scheme more refined, and his drawing firmer. Pissarro was emerging enriched from his trials and able to benefit entirely from the liberty of expression at last regained.
Although Pissarro was inspired by Jean-Franois Millet, who by 1880, five years after his death, was universally recognised and much copied, he did not treat his peasants with the same romanticism. In his article about the seventh Impressionist exhibition of 1880s, Octave Mirbeau declared: "Some had reproached Pissarro with imitating Millet, but nothing could be more absurd. Pissarro imitates nothing but nature itself, and he sees it with a very individual eye: gay and beautiful light, limpidly serene transparencies, and along with this very tight, very expert draughtsmandhip in a style that belongs absolutely to him alone" (O. Mirbeau, 'Exposition de Peinture. 1, rue Lafitte', La France, 21 May 1886).
Pissarro had visited the major Millet exhibition in Paris in May of 1887 and sent a note to his son saying, "Millet's drawings are a hundred times better than his paintings which are now dated" (quoted in J. Rewald, Camille Pissarro: Letters to his son Lucien, New York, 1943, p. 110). Fired by this, Pissarro left Paris for Eragny in late May and embarked upon the series of gouaches based on drawings relating to Millet compositions, to which the present work belongs. On 1 June he writes to Lucien, "I finished four gouaches of which two are pretty good, Market of Pontoise (P. & V. 1413) and Cow-Girl of Eragny (P. & V. 1426-27). The two others are so-so ... Impossible to work outdoors; continued thunderstorms. I am working hard at gouaches. I am beginning my large canvas, and continuing my landscape with the hare" (op. cit., p. 114).
The lightness and purity of colour which Pissarro had acquired during his divisionist phase of the mid-decade in oils, was now captured in this series of particularly luminous gouaches. Many of these gouaches are small format and painted on prepared linen (see lot 4), rarer are the large format gouaches executed directly onto paper, of which the present piece is a particularly fine example.
In the late 1880s Pissarro had become frustrated with pure pointillism. The rigours of working with the dot were too restrictive and destroying the sense of artistic spontaneity which lay at the very heart of Impressionism. Just as he was painting the present gouache, Pissarro was describing his new direction to his son, Lucien. In a letter of July 1887 he writes: "How can one combine the purity and simplicity of the dot with the fullness, supleness, liberty, spontaneity and freshness of sensations postulated by our impressionist art? This is the question which preoccupies me, for this dot is meagre, lacking in body, diaphanous, more monotonous than simple, even in the Seurats, particularly in the Seurats...," (as quoted in C. Lloyd, Camille Pissarro, London, 1981, p. 110). The dissatisfaction resulted in a further shift in Pisarro's style. His execution now became more subtle, his colour scheme more refined, and his drawing firmer. Pissarro was emerging enriched from his trials and able to benefit entirely from the liberty of expression at last regained.