Working during the last half of the 19th century, Julien Dupré was an artist, considered by most, to be one of the leading exponents of the second generation of Realist painters; a group that also includes Leon Lhermitte, Jules Bastien-Lepage and Pascal Dagnan-Bouveret. Like J.F. Millet and J. Breton, before them, these artists devoted their artistic careers to the depiction of the toils of the French peasant - often seen hard at work in the fields.

As Hollister Sturges states in "Jules Breton and the French Rural Tradition" (1982, Joslyn Art Museum): 'Salon critics rightly perceived Julien Dupré as Breton's closest follower. Through idealization of form, he invested his peasant women with a heroic aura, though unli...