The Trough
1864
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Sheet: 10 1/8 × 13 1/16 in. (25.8 × 33.3 cm) Plate: 5 1/2 × 8 1/4 in. (14 × 21 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1927
Accession Number
27.10.50
Tags
Art Historical Context
**The Trough** (1864) by Charlesque captures the quiet rhythm of rural life, a hallmark of the French Barbizon school. Jacque, a 19th-century painter andmaker, specialized in pastoral scenes featuring farm animals, drawing inspiration from the natural landscapes around Barbizon village. Created during a time when Realism was challenging idealized Romanticism, this etching reflects the movement's emphasis on everyday peasant and the harmony between humans, animals, and nature—much like works by contemporaries Jean-François Millet and Théodore Rousseau. As an etching, the work showcases Jacque'...
About the Artist
Charles Jacque
Charles-Émile Jacque (1813–1894) was a pioneering French painter, engraver, and illustrator whose career bridged the worlds of printmaking and pastoral painting. Born in Paris amid a difficult childhood, he apprenticed at age seventeen to a map engraver, mastering drypoint technique and producing his first etching in 1830—a copy of a head after Rembrandt. After serving seven years in the French Ar...