Camille Pissarro

Jean-Baptiste Faure, Paris (acquired before 1902)
Louis Maurice Faure, Paris (by descent from the above)
Galerie Durand-Ruel, New York & Galeries Georges Petit, Paris (acquired from the above on 1st February 1919)
Galerie de L'Élysée (Alex Maguy), Paris (acquired from the above on 23rd January 1941)
Sale: Sotheby's, London, 23rd October 1963, lot 63
C. Dracoulis, Switzerland
Sale: Galerie Motte, Geneva, 23rd May 1964, lot 58
O'Hana Gallery, London (by June 1964)
Sale: Christie's, London, 25th March 1980, lot 14
Sale: Sotheby's, London, 25th March 1986, lot 11
Galerie Marumo, Los Angeles
Mr Friedland, Florida
Sale: Christie's, London, 27th June 1988, lot 13
Galerie Nichido, Tokyo
Private Collection

Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Camille Pissarro, 1904, no. 51
New York, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Recently Imported Works by Pissarro, 1919, no. 1
New York, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paintings by Camille Pissarro, 1923, no. 1
Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Tableaux par Camille Pissarro, 1928, no. 26
London, O'Hana Gallery, Summer Exhibitions of Paintings and Sculpture of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, 1964, no. 27

Ludovic-Rodo Pissarro & Lionello Venturi, Camille Pissarro: son art - son oeuvre, Paris, 1939, vol. I, no. 414, catalogued; vol. II, no. 414, illustrated pl. 84
Joachim Pissarro & Claire Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, Pissarro, Critical Catalogue of Paintings, Paris, 2005, vol. II, no. 530, illustrated in colour p. 367

The canvas is lined. Apart from a fine vertical 1cm. line of retouching to the woman's head and a small 0.5cm. line of associated retouching just above it, visible under UV light, this work is in very good condition. Colours: The colours are richer and fuller in the original.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Pissarro painted upwards of three hundred pictures of the landscape in and around Pontoise between 1866 and 1883, subjecting the rural milieu to a sustained examination through his art. The environs of Pontoise was carefully selected by the artist; the variety and features of the landscape epitomised Pissarro's ideals of the picturesque.  Located some twenty-five miles northwest of Paris, the town's economy included both industry and agriculture, providing the artist with both semi-urban scenes a well as farmers working in the fields. As he declared to Claude Monet in a letter of 1882, "Pontoise, from every point of view, suits me".

In the present work, Pissarro moulds the landscape round the figures of the peasant and the ass. The rural workers were an inherent part of the fabric of the landscape, and in Pissarro's landscapes they are generic types, symbolising rootedness and continuity. Although Pissarro was a socially conscious landscape painter, his works providing an unromanticised portrait of a modernising and somewhat polarised rural society, he does not have a polemic intent. Pissarro never identified with his subjects, and his peasant figures tend to serve pictural purposes, helping define space within the composition.

Pissarro's techniques constantly evolved across his time at Pontoise, incorporating the broad slabs of palette-knifed impasto of the mid-1860s to the textured, tapestry-like paintings of the early 1880s, but at all points the key aspect of Pissarro's art is the unity of the painting. In this work, the stippled brushwork, made up of tiny vibrant strokes, dissolve the distinctions and traditional hierarchies between objects in the composition, creating a dense, pastose surface in which the textured of the brushwork and the tonal harmonies of the composition take precedence over the subject matter.