A Shepherdess with Her Flock

Jean-François Millet

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Millet settled in Barbizon, a village outside of Paris, in 1849 and dedicated himself to portraying scenes of rural life. The solitary shepherdess tending to her flock became a popular motif in his drawings and paintings. While Millet’s peaceful representations of the French countryside sought to ennoble the lives of peasants, he also provoked controversy by honestly portraying the hardships of rural poverty. Despite his focus on the timeless figure of the shepherdess, the inclusion of two farmers at work in the distance serves as a reminder of the arduous labor of provincial life.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art