Jean-François Millet's 'Waiting': a 'realist' religious painting

• Autores: Simon Kelly
• Localización: Burlington magazine, ISSN 0007-6287, Vol. 151, Nº 1274, 2009, págs. 298-305
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Jean-Fraņcois Millet's religious painting Waiting (Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City) originally had avant-garde and “realist” qualities. Waiting was inspired by an episode in the Bible recounting the travels of Tobias with the archangel Raphael and his eventual discovery of a cure for his father's blindness. In it, Millet seeks to transpose biblical themes into a naturalistic vein of contemporary peasant costume and a familiar village setting, which went against the trends of the period for idealized or historicized religious imagery. When exhibited at the Salon of 1861 along with two other works by Millet, it was the painting that attracted the greatest controversy. When placed within its original context, it carried considerable shock value, with repeated charges of “ugliness,” of associations with Socialism and the outsider religious creed of Mormonism. During a period when discourse at the Salon centered on idealized episodes from the Bible, Millet's painting signaled a “realist” and antiacademic riposte by using nonprofessional peasant models in a blatantly rural setting. It stands as a powerful example of progressive and challenging art.