La vallée heureuse (The Happy Valley)

Artist Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (French, 1796–1875)

Date1873

Mediumoil on panel

Dimensionscanvas: 61.4 × 47 cm (24 3/16 × 18 1/2 in.)
framed: 84.5 × 70.5 × 11.4 cm (33 1/4 × 27 3/4 × 4 1/2 in.)

ClassificationsPaintings

Credit LineTheodore T. and Mary G. Ellis Collection

Terms

Object number1940.50

Label TextAn early catalogue of Corot’s work notes that he painted this landscape from nature in 1868 and modified it in his studio in 1873. The location is either Coubron, a town twelve miles to the east of Paris that Corot began to visit in 1867, or his family’s country residence of Ville-d’Avray. In his later work, like this painting, the ways in which Corot’s approach to landscape prefigured impressionism are evident: the unpretentious rendering of the natural world, attention to light and the visual effects of the atmosphere, and loose brushwork. The early impressionists invited him to display his work with theirs at the first impressionist exhibition, which was held in 1874, but he chose not to participate.Provenancesold by the artist to Alfred Nunes (1873); A. Nunes Sale, Drouot, Paris (April 16, 1894, no. 13); C. Croal Thompson, London (?); John Levy, New York (?); Theodore T. Ellis, Worcester, MA (1919); bequeathed by Ellis' wife, Mary G. Ellis to Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA (1940).

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