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A Clearing in the Forest of Fontainebleau
- Landscape
- Forest
- Blue
- White
- Green
- Brown
- Barbizon
- Barbizon
"French Paintings 1789-1929 from the Collection of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.," Dayton Art Institute, March 25 - May 22, 1960. (Exhib. cat. no. 30).
"Paintings of the Barbizon School," Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, Jan. 6 - 29, 1962. (Exhib. cat. no. 44).
"French Landscape Painters from Four Centuries," Finch College Museum of Art, New York, Oct. 20, 1965 - Jan. 9, 1966. (Exhib. cat. no. 20).
"The Second Empire 1852 - 1870," Philadelphia Museum of Art, Detroit Institute of Arts, and Grand Palais, Paris, Oct. 1, 1978 - July 2, 1979. (Exhib. cat. no. VI-103).
"Millet and his Barbizon Contemporaries," April - Sept. 1985, Japan: Keio Department Store, April 5 - 24, 1985; The Hanshin Department Store, Ltd., May 2 - 14, 1985; The Miyazaki Prefectural Institution, May 18 - June 23, 1985; Fukushima Prefectural Museum of Art, June 29 - July 28, 1985; Yamanashi Prefectural Museum of Art, August 4 - Sept. 8, 1985. (Exhib. cat. no. 89).
"French Paintings from the Chrysler Museum," North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, NC, May 31 - Sept. 14, 1986, Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL, Nov. 6, 1986 - Jan. 18, 1987. (Exhib. cat. no. 24).
"The Rise of Landscape Painting in France: Corot to Monet," High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA, Jan. 28 - March 29, 1992; IBM Gallery of Science and Art, NYC, July 30 - Sept. 28, 1991; Dallas Museum of Art, TX, Nov. 10, 1991 - Jan. 5, 1992; High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA, Jan. 28 - March 29, 1992. (Exhib. cat. no. 107).
"Paintings by Théodore Rousseau," Salander-O'Reilly Galleries, LLC, New York City, February 6 - March 10, 2002.
"In the Forest of Fontainebleau: Painters and Photographers from Corot to Monet," National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., March 2 - June 8, 2008; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, July 13 - October 19, 2008
French, 1812–1867
A Clearing in the Forest of Fontainebleau, ca. 1860–62
Oil on canvas
Just touched with red, the tiny figure far down the road is the only human presence in Théodore Rousseau’s luminous landscape. Celebrating nature above humankind, Rousseau was an outspoken naturalist who nurtured the Barbizon group’s enduring respect for the ancient woods of Fontainebleau. Here he conveys the clarity and dewy calm of a spring morning as the first rays of sun bathe the ancient oaks of the forest in a golden glow. The site depicted is the Carrefour de la Reine-Blanche—the Crossroads of the White Queen—a glade in the forest not far from Barbizon.
Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. 71.2054
French, 1812-1867
A Clearing in the Forest of Fontainebleau, ca. 1860-1862
Oil on canvas, 32½" x 57¼" (82.5 x 145.4 cm)
Signed lower left: _Rousseau._
Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., 71.2054
References: Tokyo, 1985, no. 89; Harrison, _CM_, 1986, no. 24; Manchester, 1991-92, no. 107.
Théodore Rousseau was a founding member of the Barbizon group of artists (nos. 72, 77, 80, 89, 103, 112) and one of the most esteemed landscape painters in mid-nineteenth-century France. In the late 1820s he was already at work at Chailly, near the Fontainebleau Forest. There, and on subsequent visits to the Auvergne (1830) and Normandy (1831), he produced a revolutionary series of vibrant and spontaneous _plein-air_ landscapes, "pure" landscapes that dispensed with traditional narrative subject matter and classical compositional schemes.
Rousseau's subsequent career in Paris was a constant struggle against the conservative forces of the Salon and Académie Royale. Between 1836 and 1841 his paintings were consistently rejected by Salon juries, a cruel example of official persecution that earned him the sardonic soubriquet, _le grande refusé_. In 1841 the frustrated Rousseau turned his back on the Salon, where he did not exhibit again until 1849.
The years of rejection had their effect on the artist, who took care after 1850 to produce landscapes more in line with official taste. These composed and carefully worked pictures borrowed much from the landscape art of the seventeenth-century Dutch masters. _A Clearing in the Forest of Fontainebleau_, one of several canvases that Rousseau undertook at Barbizon in 1860-62 is an impressive example of his mature, more finished and traditional style. Its composition and the handling of foliage recall particularly the works of the Dutch landscapist Meindert Hobbema. the site depicted may be the _Carrefour de la Reine Blanche_ ("The Crossroads of the White Queen"), a glade in the forest near Barbizon. The site was a favorite of Rousseau's. Three of his other paintings show the same spot; the best known of these is in the Louvre, Paris. The Chrysler Museum picture conveys the clarity and dewy calm of a spring morning near Barbizon, when the first rays of the rising sun bathe the ancient oaks of Fontainebleau in a golden glow.
Jefferson C. Harrison. _The Chrysler Museum Handbook of the European and American Collections: Selected Paintings, Sculpture and Drawings_. Norfolk, VA: The Chrysler Museum, 1991, No. 86, 109, color ill.