Vachere au Bord de l’Eau
Camille Pissarro
Description
Gallery Rotation Spring/Summer 2012
Camille Pissarro
France, 1830–1903
Vachere au bord de l’eau
1890
Etching and drypoint
Gift of Ruth W. and Clarence J. Boldt, Jr., 2008/2.401
Millet and Pissarro were important printmakers and contributed to the revival of interest in printmaking in France in the second half of the nineteenth
century. Millet brought to his work an emphasis on line as well as a nuanced tonal quality and a concern with printing effects: the printed impressions of his Two Cows can be tremendously varied in their inks and papers.
Pissarro was a prolific printmaker and his Haymakers, an important subject for the artist, shows his debt to Millet’s imagery. He too was attentive to the printing process and his impressions are often annotated; the inscription on the Vachere au bord de l’eau (cowherder at the water’s edge) indicates that it was an artist’s proof (epreuve d’artiste). This was a work of art in its own right, not one in a series of steps towards a final state of the image. The deep contrasts
of light and dark in this version give it an elegiac quality.
Subject Matter:
This print has an elegaic quality as the woman dreamily looks in the direction of the cows at her feet. The use of drypoint give the work am added atmospheric richness that complements the mood of reverie.
Physical Description:
A woman sits at the left on a grassy bank looking at a group of cows standing in water. Behind are trees and a hill rising up in the distance.
Possible watermark at center left (of verso); image shows a fleur de lis over a triangle. Paper size: lh 26 2/5cm & rh 26 1/2cm x w 19 1/2cm. Plate size: lh 19 7/10cm & rh 19 9/10cm x w 13 2/5cm. Image size: lh 19 1/10cm & rh 19cm x tw 12 2/5cm & bw 12 1/2cm.
Usage Rights:
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