From the 17th to the 20th century · Gestures, seasons and dignity of work

From the fields to the workshops, this collection shows work as effort, know-how and human condition: sowing, mowing, washing, cooking, walking towards the factory or interrupting the daily gesture for a moment.

The representation of peasants and workers runs through the entire history of European painting. In 17th century genre scenes, the rural world can become a story of sociability, celebration or moral observation. In the 18th century, the pastoral landscape often ordered figures in harmonious nature. The 19th century changed the scale and the look: realism placed agricultural work at the center of the painting, while Millet gave curved bodies a monumental presence. The 19th century changed the scale and the look: realism placed agricultural work at the center of the painting, while Millet gave curved bodies a monumental presence. Pissarro in turn painted the inhabitants of Éragny with attention paid to gestures, clothing and collective life threatened by industrialization. Bouguereau in turn painted the inhabitants of Éragny with attention paid to gestures, clothing and collective life threatened by industrialization. Bouguereau sometimes idealizes the figure rural, when Van Gogh, Leibl or Schiele accentuate the material, fatigue or individuality. In the 20th century, the factory worker joined the peasant: the movement towards work, mining and machines broadened the subject to industrial society. The selection "Peasants and Workers" notably compares The Reapers of the Promised Land and A Peasant Girl in a Straw Hat. His reading favors composition.

Work here becomes a history of the body: it weighs, repeats, transforms the landscape and gives ordinary figures an extraordinary presence.