Landscape with Cows and Oaks

c. 1860

Each element of this composition focuses attention on the group of sturdy oaks in the center. Rocks and a gnarled tree encircle the oaks in the foreground, while gray clouds trace their tops. Rousseau recorded the light and color of this natural landscape with lively brushstrokes, revealing what one writer called his knowledge of the “language of forests.”

Medium	oil on panel
Dimensions	6 7/8 x 10 1/4 in. (17.5 x 26 cm) Frame: 11 1/2 x 15 x 1 7/8 in. (29.2 x 38.1 x 4.8 cm)
Object Number	1955.848
Acquisition	Acquired by Sterling and Francine Clark before 1955
Status	Off View

Image Caption

Théodore Rousseau, Landscape with Cows and Oaks, c. 1860, oil on panel. Clark Art Institute, 1955.848

Select Bibliography

Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1970. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1972. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984. Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992. Anonymous. "Nineteenth-Century Painting and Sculpture." The Magazine Antiques 152 (October 1997): 522–31. Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lyon. L'Ecole de Barbizon. Jun. 20-Sep. 9, 2002. L'école de Barbizon: Peindre en plein air avant l'impressionnisme. Musée des Beaux Arts de Lyon. 2002:p, 192, Plate 97. Lees, Sarah, ed. Nineteenth-Century European Paintings at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven and London: distributed by Yale University Press, 2012.

Read more- Collapse
EUROPEAN PAINTINGS CATALOGUE ENTRY

Provenance

Thiem, Berlin, sold to Goupil, 17 June 1881, as Bords de rivière vache sous arbres; [Goupil, Paris, sold to Knoedler, 20 June 1881];¹ [Knoedler, Paris, 1881–1922, sold to Clark, 3 Feb. 1922]; Robert Sterling Clark (1922–55); Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1955. 1. See Goupil Stock Books, book 10, p. 173, no. 15493.