MIllet was the most committed painter-draftsman of the Realist
movement in France. His paintings, pastels, and finished drawings were all prepared with numerous compositional sketches and careful figure
or detail studies; and his often quirky outline drawings are well
known. Two Women Sewing by Lamplight is unusual in Millet's early oeuvre, however, as a drawing executed almost entirely
in tone, rather than with defining lines.

Two Women Sewing by Lamplight is a preparatory work for a
painting of an outdoor scene which used only a small oil lamp as a
source of light. As such it demonstrates Millet's careful attention to the problems of rendering three-dimensional forms in limited natural light. The drawing was used for both the boston painting Women
Sewing by Lamplight (La Veillée) and a finished drawing of the
same subject in the Worcester Museum of Art, Worcester, Massachusetts, completed around 1853-54; and probably for a smaller
drawing as well, lost since 1938, which was in turn a stage in the
development of an etching of the same subject, in 1855-56.

We are grateful to Alexandra Murphy for her assistance in preparing
this catalogue entry.