id: 149421 accession number: 1978.73 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1978.73 updated: 2022-09-22 10:16:16.939000 The Farm at the Entrance of the Wood, 1860–80. Rosa Bonheur (French, 1822–1899). Oil on fabric; unframed: 28.4 x 40.3 cm (11 3/16 x 15 7/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. John B. Dempsey 1978.73 title: The Farm at the Entrance of the Wood title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1860–80 creation date earliest: 1860 creation date latest: 1880 current location: 220 19th Century European creditline: Gift of Mrs. John B. Dempsey copyright: --- culture: France, 19th century technique: oil on fabric department: Modern European Painting and Sculpture collection: Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960 type: Painting find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * Rosa Bonheur (French, 1822–1899) - artist The eldest of four children, Rosa Bonheur received drawing lessons in the studio of her father, Raymond Bonheur (1796-1849). From early on she pre-ferred to draw animals and went to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris to study and draw them. She first exhibited at the Salon of 1841. The family moved to the suburbs where Bonheur had an even more easy access to animals, and she visited slaughterhouses in order to study their anatomy. Her Salon submissions became increasingly successful, but her first major breakthrough occurred with Plowing in the Nivernais (Salon 1849, Musée National du Château, Fontainebleau). Based on Sand's rustic novel La mare au Diable (1846), the work represents a heroic depiction of rural life that Bonheur had elevated to the standards of a history painting. Her international reputation was established with The Horse Fair (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), presented at the Salon of 1853. She celebrated her final triumph at the 1855 Salon with Haymaking in the Auvergne (R. W. Norton Art Gallery, Shreveport, La.), after which she increasingly withdrew from public life. She mostly worked on her many commissions and shared her life with Nathalie Micas. The couple traveled extensively, and in 1859 Bonheur bought the Château de By in Thomery near Fontainebleau, where they lived in relative solitude. Bonheur had also little contact with the nearby group of Barbizon painters. The widespread appreciation for her work did not diminish, however, and in 1865 Empress Eugénie visited her studio in order to award her a knighthood in the Legion of Honor, making her the first woman to carry that title. Nathalie Micas died in 1889, to Bonheur's great distress, but she soon befriended the American painter Anna Klumpke (1856-1942), with whom she would eventually live and who became her biographer. Even though Bonheur was appreciated in France, her principal collectors were in England and the United States. According to Albert Wolff, she was "one of the three most highly priced French painters in America . . . the other two [were] Jules Breton [q.v.] and Meissonier [q.v.]"1 Bonheur was one of the foremost animaliers, or animal painters, of her time and was also active as a sculptor. Her painting style changed little throughout her career, and her work found little esteem with more pro-gressive artists and critics. However, her unorthodox life as an independent and successful woman in a male-dominated society has recently generated great interest, especially among feminist art historians. 1. Le Figaro (11 July 1890), 1. --- measurements: Unframed: 28.4 x 40.3 cm (11 3/16 x 15 7/8 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Year in Review: 1978 opening date: 1979-02-13T05:00:00 Year in Review: 1978. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 13-March 18, 1979). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE (Georges Petit Galerie, Paris, France, May 30, 1900, Artist's estate sale (lot 884), sold to Homer H. Johnson) date: 1900 footnotes: citations: Homer H. Johnson, [1862-1960] Cleveland, OH, by descent to his daughter, Mrs. John B. Dempsey date: 1900-1960 footnotes: citations: Mrs. John B. Dempsey [1902-2005] Cleveland, OH, given to the the Cleveland Museum of Art on 20 November 20,1978. date: 1960-1978 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1978- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: Bonheur's artistic work led her to pastures, fairs, and even slaughterhouses—unlikely places for a proper 19th- century lady. Long dresses were too cumbersome for her rugged lifestyle; in order to wear trousers on the job she had to seek permission from the local government. digital description: wall description: One of the most celebrated female artists of the 19th century, Bonheur established an international reputation by exhibiting at the Paris Salons. Empress Eug​é​nie, wife of Napoleon III, visited her studio to personally confer the Legion of Honor, making Bonheur the first woman to receive the award. This painting may have been inspired by the rustic houses in the vicinity of the Forest of Fontainebleau, where Bonheur lived for more than 40 years. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Roger-Milès, L. Rosa Bonheur, sa vie--son œuvre; ouvrage orné de 22 gravures hors texte et de 54 gravures dans le texte. Paris, France: Société d'édition artistique, 1900. page number: url: Klumpke, Anna. Rosa Bonheur; sa vie, son œuvre. Paris, France: E. Flammarion, 1909. page number: url: Stanton, Theodore. Reminiscences of Rosa Bonheur. New York, NY: Hacker Art Books, 1976. page number: url: Lee, Sherman E. "The Year in Review for 1978." The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art LXVI, no. 1 (January, 1979): 2-47. page number: Mentioned: p. 43, no. 30 url: Shriver, Rosalia. Rosa Bonheur: With a Checklist of Works in American Collections. Philadelphia, PA: Art Alliance Press, 1982. page number: Mentioned: p. 56; Reproduced: p. 71 url: Miquel, Pierre. Le paysage français au XIXe siècle, 1840-1900: l'école de la nature. École De La Nature. Maurs-la-Jolie, France: Editions de la Martinelle, 1985. page number: url: Chong,Alan. European & American Painting in the Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993. page number: Reproduced: P. 15 url: Klumpke, Anna. Rosa Bonheur: The Artist's (Auto)Biography. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1997. page number: url: Bonheur, Rosa. Rosa Bonheur: All Nature's Children. New York, NY: Dahesh Museum, 1998. page number: url: D'Argencourt, Louise and Roger Diederen. The Cleveland Museum of Art: Catalogue of Paintings, Part Four; European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999. page number: Reproduced: p. 14 url: Bonheur, Rosa. Rosa Bonheur. 2020. page number: Reproduced; p. 25 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1978.73/1978.73_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1978.73/1978.73_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1978.73/1978.73_full.tif