The Sower (Millet)

The Sower

Type: Painting
Medium: Oil on canvas
Genre: daily life, Landscape
Themes: struggle, daily life, Nature
Artist: Jean-François Millet
Movement: Realism
Region: France
Period: 19th Century

Summary of “The Sower” by Jean-François Millet:

• Artist & Year: Jean-François Millet, 1850.
• Location: In the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston since 1917.
• Context: Millet was part of the School of Barbizon, known for realistic landscapes and social realism. He painted the sower theme multiple times, including a version in the National Museum of Wales (1847–48) and others in Kofu, Pittsburgh, and Williamstown.
• Description: The painting shows a peasant sowing crops in winter, with a low viewpoint emphasizing the sower’s monumental presence. Crows and a man harrowing the ground are also depicted.
• Reception: Praised by Clement de Ris as “energetic,” but criticized by Théophile Gautier. The painting was seen as radical and controversial in Paris at the time.
• Influence: Inspired Vincent van Gogh, who used brighter colors in his own versions of the painting.