French School From The Second Half Of The 19th Century, Landscape Of A Moor

French school from the second half of the 19th century
Landscape of a moor: houses and farms and vegetation
Oil on canvas
23.5 x 41 cm
Apocryphal mention, on the back of the stretcher: “Harpignie” (sic)

Dimensions with the frame: 30.5 x 48 cm

Relining
Restorations visible, which explains the price (see detailed photographs)
Good condition overall, the landscape remains very pleasant

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Charming painting in which each element of the landscape, the hovels, the sky, the reliefs and the vegetation is painted with a hand that is both sensitive and sure. Every detail is carefully thought out and comes into harmony with the whole. A typical work of the second half of the 19th century, with a look at Corot and the Barbizon painters, but also a more modern sensitivity, in the absence of anecdote and certain very subtle areas of paint.

A painting that a fine connoisseur such as the historian and collector Pierre Miquel would certainly have greatly appreciated. He would perhaps have attributed it to one of the lesser known French painters of the 19th century, effectively guided by Henri Harpignies (apocryphal mention on the back), such as Léon Villavieille, Auguste Anastasi or even Léon-Germain Pelouse.

The sensibility of the composition is in fact quite close to what Léon Germain Pelouse (1838-1891), a painter from the Doubs region, liked to explore. In his landscapes, the sky occupies the space halfway up with the earth and its reliefs. The same point of view is often felt from a low angle, which allows the viewer to feel at the same time the air circulating in the vegetation, the silence of the moor and the distant and poetic whistle of the wind.