Camille Pissarro

(possibly) Ambroise Vollard, Paris

Roque Freire, Buenos Aires (by circa 1920)

Private Collection, Buenos Aires (until 1994)

Acquired by the present owner in 1994

Joachim Pissarro and Claire Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, Pissarro, Critical Catalogue of Paintings, vol. II, Paris, 2005, no. 161, illustrated in color p. 143

The canvas is lined. There are some minor craqueleur in the center of the composition toward the taller tree. Apart from one area of retouching in the tree on the left of the composition and a few lines in the upper right corner, this work is in good condition. Colors: The sky is less warm, and the green tones are much stronger in the original.
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The present composition depicts the rural home of Pissarro's neighbor, Monsieur Musy, the pit-sawyer.   It was painted in 1870, one year after Pissarro moved to the picturesque, rural region of Louveciennes.  In the years that followed, the artist painted extensively in the region, only interrupted by his exile in London during the Franco-Prussian War.  He frequently employed the same basic format: a road receding into the distance cutting a diagonal across the picture space, seen under different atmospheric conditions. Monet, too, worked in Louveciennes at this time, exploring the same themes.

 

For Pissarro, the Franco-Prussian war was a traumatic experience: news reached him in London that his house in Louveciennes had been used as a butchery in the German invasion, and some of his store of pictures used as duckboards in the muddy garden. Upon his return, after the Commune, he spent some time repeating his compositions of 1869-70. For example, La Route de Versailles, Louveciennes (Pissarro and Venturi, no. 77), executed in 1870, is reproduced with variations in La Route de Louveciennes of 1872 (Pissarro and Venturi, no. 138). And the present picture is the first version set in late summer, of the composition La Grande Route later repeated in 1872 (Pissarro and Venturi, no. 137).

 

The years 1869-70 are recognized as crucial in Pissarro's development as an impressionist. As Richard Bretell writes: "Within one year Pissarro's pictures became smaller in size, more varied in palette and looser in facture. Most important was the fact that they displayed a growing interest in light, color and atmosphere, all of which are closely related to changes of season and time of day" (Richard Bretell, 'Camille Pissarro: A Revision,' Pissarro, London, Hayward Gallery and traveling, 1980-81, p. 19).