Young Peasant Having Her Coffee
1879/80
Medium
Black chalk on buff laid paper, laid down on cream wove paper
Dimensions
61.4 × 47.9 cm (24 3/16 × 18 7/8 in.)
Classification
chalk
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
205665
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Beloved for his Impressionist landscapes, around 1880 Pissarro turned his attention to the human figure, producing Young Peasant Having Her Coffee, a monumental canvas of a humble subject, among other works. Hands and feet have gained notoriety for being the most difficult body parts to draw, and this sheet reveals the artist’s struggle to depict his subject’s hands. The painting was shown with a group of other new figure pictures at the seventh Impressionist exhibition in 1882. Exceedingly rare...
About the Artist
Camille Pissarro · 1831–1903
Camille Pissarro (1830-1903) stands as the patriarch of Impressionism, the only artist to exhibit in all eight Impressionist exhibitions and a mentor whose influence shaped the trajectory of modern art. Born Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro on the Caribbean island of St. Thomas to a Jewish-Portuguese merchant family, he abandoned the family business to pursue painting, eventually settling in Paris i...