Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Painting of the Day: Feeding Ducks, c. 1850

Feeding Ducks
Bocion, after 1850
The Victoria and Albert Museum



This handsome genre scene/landscape is a harmony of small figures, naturalism and fancy.  The architecture of the house belies the naturalistic roots of the scene with it's unusual stylistic nod to the medieval.

"Feeding Ducks," is the work of François Bocion (1828-1890) who was born in Lausanne.  Bocion started his career as a history painter, and the architecture of the house may, in fact, be an offshoot of those early stylistic beginnings.  In the 1840s Bocion emerged as a fancier of the rustic subject matter which characterized Realist and Naturalist works, two styles which were quite the mode in France at the time.  By the 1850s, Bocion found his muse, Lake Leman, a them which was repeated frequently in his oeuvre, and is clearly represented here.





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