Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853, oil on canvas, 39 5/16 x 51 5/16 in. (99.9 x 130.3 cm), Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 31-47
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A painting depicting a herd of cattle resting near a two trees and hilly cliff side with a small group standing at the top. On the left side, a man wearing a brown hat and shirt with blue shorts sits on a stack of rocks and plays a wooden shawm instrument. Near him, are two young children with a black and white dog. The little girl holds a long walking stick while the boy stands next to her seemingly patting a dog. Behind them, is a large lake, with another land with a tower standing across it.
Fig. 1. Aelbert Cuyp (Dutch, 1620–1691), Landscape near Rhenen, 1650–1655, oil on canvas, 66 3/4 x 90 2/16 in. (170 x 229 cm), Musée du Louvre, Paris, inv. 1190. Photo: Franck Rau. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY
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A black and white print of a painting depicting a herd of sheep and cattle in a large grass field. In the foreground, one bull is resting on the grass while another bull stands near him. To the right of them is a person on a white horse near a large heard of white sheep's and lambs. The background consists of hills and forests in the distance.
Fig. 2. Illustrator: [Louis Hippolyte?] Mouchot, engraver: Noël-Eugène Sotain (1816–1874), after Constant Troyon, La Prairie, 1865, wood engraving, dimensions unknown. Reproduced in Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405
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Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853

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doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534

ArtistConstant Troyon, French, 1810–1865
TitleCattle Pasture in the Touraine
Object Date1853
Alternate and Variant TitlesPasturage in the Touraine, near Château-la-Vallière, Vaches au Pâturage, La Prairie
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions (Unframed)39 5/16 × 51 5/16 in. (99.9 × 130.3 cm)
SignatureSigned and dated lower left: C. TROYON. 1853.
Credit LineThe Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Purchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 31-47
Catalogue Entry

curatorial

Citation

Chicago:

Simon Kelly, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” catalogue entry in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.5407.

MLA:

Kelly, Simon. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” catalogue entry. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.5407.

Cattle Pasture in the Touraine shows an area of rich farming land in the Loire Valley around the town of Tours, in the center of France. In the foreground, two large cattle, one standing and one seated, are both seen from behind. The central standing animal, with red pied markings, is perhaps of the Normande breed, and the brown creature in repose is possibly a Limousin. Other cattle are further back to the left, and a flock of sheep are to the right, overseen by a shepherd—or property manager—on horseback and in a blue work smock and black cap. The bleating sheep evoke the sounds of this rural scene.

Troyon here probably represents the property around the château of Vivier-des-Landes, near the village of Château-Lavallière, on the north banks of the Loire River. This was a large château, approximately twenty-five miles northwest of Tours, which was the home of his pupil, the landscape painter, Léon-Félix Loysel (d. 1899), also a student of Théodore Rousseau (1812–1867). The wealthy Loysel family had acquired the château in 1852.1The château has now been renamed as Château Golf des Sept Tours. According to L. V., “Nécrologie,” Journal d’Indre-et-Loire, no. 135 (June 10, 1899): 2, Léon-Félix Loysel died on May 13, 1899. Troyon’s early biographer, Henri Dumesnil, noted that Troyon spent the summer of 1853 here.2Dumesnil noted that “il travailla beaucoup à son retour, pendant l’été qu’il passa presque tout entier en Touraine, sur la rive gauche de la Loire, non loin de la Sologne, au Vivier-des-Landes [sic], dans la propriété de son ami, M. L.” (he [Troyon] worked a lot on his return [from his May 1853 visit to England], during the summer that he spent almost entirely in Touraine, on the left bank of the Loire, not far from Sologne, at Vivier-les-Landes, on the property of his friend, M. L.). Henri Dumesnil, Troyon: Souvenirs intimes (Paris: H. Laurens et Rapilly, 1888), 76–77. Dumesnil was mistaken in saying that the château was on the left bank, since it is to the north of the Loire, and thus on the right bank. He provided teaching advice to his young pupil and found rich source material in the lush landscape around the château. Troyon returned to Vivier-des-Landes regularly throughout the 1850s and often depicted the agricultural life around the property.3Dumesnil, Troyon, 67: “Après être allé en Normandie et en Brie, Troyon se rendit plus tard en Touraine, au château du Vivier-des-Landes, auprès de Château-la-Vallière, chez un autre ami, M. L., qui faisait de la peinture et auquel il donna des conseils. Il vint là pendant sept ou huit ans” (After having gone to Normandy and Brie, Troyon went later to the château of Vivier-des-Landes, near Château-la-Vallière, the home of another friend, M. L., who painted and to whom he gave advice. He went there for seven or eight years). He also often represented Loysel’s hunting dogs.4Herding Cattle Before the Storm (19th-Century European Art including The Orientalist Sale, Sotheby’s, New York, April 18, 2008, no. 63), and A Seated Basset Hound (19th-Century European Art, Sotheby’s, New York, November 3, 2015, no. 41). In the accompanying catalogue entries, it is noted that Troyon first visited Loysel in 1854, but his trips in fact date to 1853. See also Hound Pointing (1860; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) and Gamekeeper and Dogs (1854; Musée d’Orsay, Paris), and also Game Warden Driving his Dogs into the Forest (1854–56; Musée d’Orsay, Paris), where the forest worker has the same blue smock.

Cattle Pasture in the Touraine shows not only Troyon’s mastery of animal anatomy—he was acclaimed as an animalier, a specialist in animal painting—but also his importance as a landscape painter. Much of the canvas is devoted to the cloud formations as well as the play of light outlining the bodies of the cattle. In fact, Troyon first came to prominence as a landscape painter in the 1840s, regularly showing ambitious landscapes at the Paris SalonSalon, the: Exhibitions organized by the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture (Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture) and its successor the Academy of Fine Arts (Académie des Beaux Arts), which took place in Paris from 1667 onwards. from 1844 to 1848. Such works often depict sites in the Forest of Fontainebleau, as in the large-scale scene of tree felling shown at the 1848 Salon and acquired by the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lille. Early on in his career, he had trained at a Sèvres porcelain factory, decorating porcelain with picturesque rural scenes. Troyon was particularly known for rendering effects of hazy, evanescent dawn light, as seen in his later, large-scale easel paintings Boeufs allant au labour, effet de matin (Oxen Going to Plow, Morning Effect; 1855; Musée d’Orsay, Paris) and Departure for Market (1859; Hermitage, Saint Petersburg). In Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, he shows his ability to render a more dramatic effect. Light breaks through the rolling cumulus clouds, revealing a peak in the blue sky, and falls on the animals’ backs. Dark clouds suggest a recent or imminent rain shower.

Although Cattle Pasture in the Touraine is grounded in the careful study of nature, it also shows Troyon’s debt to the art of the past, notably the seventeenth-century Dutch artist Aelbert Cuyp (1620–1691), whose work he had closely studied on a trip to the Netherlands in 1847. Cuyp was well known for his facility in painting cattle, at times almost humanizing them and animating their forms through luminous light effects. There were also major examples of work by Cuyp in the Louvre, including a view in which cattle are seen similarly facing an expanse of sky (Fig. 1). Troyon could also have seen the Dutch artist’s work in Parisian private collections, such as those of Paul Périer or Benjamin Delessert.5In 1841, Périer had acquired Cuyp’s well-known Vaches au bord de la mer (Cows by the Sea; unlocated) for 18,100 francs at the collection sale of Alphonse-Claude-Charles-Bernardin, Comte Perregaux. See Catalogue Raisonné des Tableaux de Diverses Écoles, Composant la précieuse galerie de feu M. le Cte Perregaux (Paris: Maulde et Renou, December 8–9, 1841), annotated copy in the library of the National Gallery, London. For Delessert’s collection, including major works by Cuyp, see “Collections particulières de Paris, M. B. Delessert,” Les Beaux-Arts 1, no. 21 (1843): 342. Troyon also studied the meticulous renderings of cattle anatomy in paintings by the Dutch artist Paulus Potter (1625–1654) during his Holland trip, but he apparently found those too detailed.6Dumesnil, Troyon, 54. For Troyon, Potter’s focus on individual animals did not allow sufficient attention to “the ensemble and unity of a work” (l’ensemble et l’unité d’une oeuvre). Troyon offered a similar criticism of the work of English animal painters, even the noted artist Edwin Landseer (1802–1873), on his trip to England in 1853. He considered their painting “too precise, too meticulous, not seeing the masses enough” (trop précis, trop mérticuleux, ne voyant pas assez les masses). The landscapes of John Constable offered an exception to this criticism. Dumesnil, Troyon, 75-76.

Fig. 1. Aelbert Cuyp (Dutch, 1620–1691), Landscape near Rhenen, 1650–1655, oil on canvas, 66 3/4 x 90 2/16 in. (170 x 229 cm), Musée du Louvre, Paris, inv. 1190. Photo: Franck Rau. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY
Fig. 1. Aelbert Cuyp (Dutch, 1620–1691), Landscape near Rhenen, 1650–1655, oil on canvas, 66 3/4 x 90 2/16 in. (170 x 229 cm), Musée du Louvre, Paris, inv. 1190. Photo: Franck Rau. © RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY
Troyon painted Cattle Pasture in Touraine at a time when he was enjoying significant interest from international collectors. Troyon was a shrewd marketer of his work, and he arguably enjoyed more commercial success in his lifetime than any other Barbizon painter. He regularly showed his work internationally, notably at the Belgian Salon.7He showed at the Belgian Salon regularly, beginning in 1845. In 1851, he showed six paintings in an exhibition orchestrated by two important Belgian dealers, Arthur Stevens and Gustave Coûteaux. At the beginning of May 1853, he traveled to England for two weeks to meet with the prominent art dealer Ernest Gambart, with the intention of developing a market among British collectors. On his return, he attended the 1853 Paris Salon, where his three pictures, including Vallée de la Touque (private collection), a Normandy view, enjoyed widespread critical praise.8Troyon’s retrospective exhibition at the 1855 Exposition Universelle was a great success. The French State had commissioned Les Boeufs allant au labeur, le matin in 1854 for the large sum of 14,000 francs. His work was also bought by Russian collectors in the 1850s, notably Kushelev-Bezborodko, hence the important paintings by Troyon now in the Hermitage, including Departure from Market, shown at the 1859 Salon. Troyon subsequently visited Touraine in the summer, producing several pictures in addition to Cattle Pasture in the Touraine.

Troyon’s paintings were much admired by the nineteen-year-old Claude Monet (1840–1926), who saw several of his works at the 1859 Paris Salon. He responded particularly to Troyon’s rendering of the changing moods of nature, describing the “marvelous” Return to the Farm (Musée d’Orsay, Paris) with “a magnificent sky . . . a lot of movement, wind in the clouds: the cows, the dogs are all of a complete beauty.”9Claude Monet to Eugène Boudin, June 3, 1859, in Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet: Vie et oeuvre (Lausanne: La Bibliothèque des Arts, 1974), 1:419: “un ciel magnifique . . . beaucoup de movement, de vent dans les nuages: les vaches, les chiens sont de toute beauté.”

Despite his commercial success, Troyon suffered mental problems and entered an asylum in his final years. Cattle Pasture in the Touraine was reproduced as a print (Fig. 2) in his obituary, written by Paul Mantz for the Gazette des Beaux-Arts in 1865.10See Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405. That this particular work was chosen to illustrate Troyon’s oeuvre suggests its importance in the artist’s output. Mantz described it thus: “We have here a superb Troyon, ambitiously conceived, vigorously executed, and absolutely full of this luxuriant vitality that the master gave as much to his animals as to his blades of grass.”11Mantz, “Troyon,” 406: “C’est là un superbe Troyon, largement conçu, vigoureusement executé, et tout plein de cette vitalité luxuriante que le maître donnait à ses animaux comme à ses brins d’herbe.” In 1865, the painting was owned by Maurice Cottier (1822–1881), a prominent figure in the Paris arts club, the Cercle de L’Union Artistique. It was exhibited in Paris in 1883 in a major show organized by the prominent dealer Georges Petit, A Hundred Masterpieces from Parisian Collections.12Albert Wolff, Exposition de Peinture: Cent Chefs-D’Œuvre des Collections Parisiennes, exh. cat (Paris: Imprimerie Pillet et Dumoulin, 1883), 101, as Pâturage de la Touraine, près Château-Lavallière. Later, the picture entered the prominent collection of the Scotsman Alexander Young (1828–1907). In 1919, it was acquired by one of the leading galleries Knoedler and Co, which subsequently transferred the painting to its New York branch. It passed through a few owners before being purchased by the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in 1931. The painting’s provenance, moving from France to Britain to the United States, highlights the international appeal of Troyon’s work, and specifically this fine example, which sums up his abilities as both animalier and landscape painter.

Fig. 2. Illustrator: [Louis Hippolyte?] Mouchot, engraver: Noël-Eugène Sotain (1816–1874), after Constant Troyon, La Prairie, 1865, wood engraving, dimensions unknown. Reproduced in Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405
Fig. 2. Illustrator: [Louis Hippolyte?] Mouchot, engraver: Noël-Eugène Sotain (1816–1874), after Constant Troyon, La Prairie, 1865, wood engraving, dimensions unknown. Reproduced in Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405

Simon Kelly
July 2019

Notes

  1. The château has now been renamed as Château Golf des Sept Tours. According to L. V., “Nécrologie,” Journal d’Indre-et-Loire, no. 135 (June 10, 1899): 2, Léon-Félix Loysel died on May 13, 1899.

  2. Dumesnil noted that “il travailla beaucoup à son retour, pendant l’été qu’il passa presque tout entier en Touraine, sur la rive gauche de la Loire, non loin de la Sologne, au Vivier-des-Landes [sic], dans la propriété de son ami, M. L.” (he [Troyon] worked a lot on his return [from his May 1853 visit to England], during the summer that he spent almost entirely in Touraine, on the left bank of the Loire, not far from Sologne, at Vivier-les-Landes, on the property of his friend, M. L.). Henri Dumesnil, Troyon: Souvenirs intimes (Paris: H. Laurens et Rapilly, 1888), 76–77. Dumesnil was mistaken in saying that the château was on the left bank, since it is to the north of the Loire, and thus on the right bank.

  3. Dumesnil, Troyon, 67: “Après être allé en Normandie et en Brie, Troyon se rendit plus tard en Touraine, au château du Vivier-des-Landes, auprès de Château-la-Vallière, chez un autre ami, M. L., qui faisait de la peinture et auquel il donna des conseils. Il vint là pendant sept ou huit ans” (After having gone to Normandy and Brie, Troyon went later to the château of Vivier-des-Landes, near Château-la-Vallière, the home of another friend, M. L., who painted and to whom he gave advice. He went there for seven or eight years).

  4. Herding Cattle Before the Storm (19th-Century European Art including The Orientalist Sale, Sotheby’s, New York, April 18, 2008, no. 63), and A Seated Basset Hound (19th-Century European Art, Sotheby’s, New York, November 3, 2015, no. 41). In the accompanying catalogue entries, it is noted that Troyon first visited Loysel in 1854, but his trips in fact date to 1853. See also Hound Pointing (1860; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) and Gamekeeper and Dogs (1854; Musée d’Orsay, Paris), and also Game Warden Driving his Dogs into the Forest (1854–56; Musée d’Orsay, Paris), where the forest worker has the same blue smock.

  5. In 1841, Périer had acquired Cuyp’s well-known Vaches au bord de la mer (Cows by the Sea; unlocated) for 18,100 francs at the collection sale of Alphonse-Claude-Charles-Bernardin, Comte Perregaux. See Catalogue Raisonné des Tableaux de Diverses Écoles, Composant la précieuse galerie de feu M. le Cte Perregaux (Paris: Maulde et Renou, December 8–9, 1841), annotated copy in the library of the National Gallery, London. For Delessert’s collection, including major works by Cuyp, see “Collections particulières de Paris, M. B. Delessert,” Les Beaux-Arts 1, no. 21 (1843): 342.

  6. Dumesnil, Troyon, 54. For Troyon, Potter’s focus on individual animals did not allow sufficient attention to “the ensemble and unity of a work” (l’ensemble et l’unité d’une oeuvre). Troyon offered a similar criticism of the work of English animal painters, even the noted artist Edwin Landseer (1802–1873), on his trip to England in 1853. He considered their painting “too precise, too meticulous, not seeing the masses enough” (trop précis, trop mérticuleux, ne voyant pas assez les masses). The landscapes of John Constable offered an exception to this criticism. Dumesnil, Troyon, 75-76.

  7. He showed at the Belgian Salon regularly, beginning in 1845. In 1851, he showed six paintings in an exhibition orchestrated by two important Belgian dealers, Arthur Stevens and Gustave Coûteaux.

  8. Troyon’s retrospective exhibition at the 1855 Exposition Universelle was a great success. The French State had commissioned Les Boeufs allant au labeur, le matin in 1854 for the large sum of 14,000 francs. His work was also bought by Russian collectors in the 1850s, notably Kushelev-Bezborodko, hence the important paintings by Troyon now in the Hermitage, including Departure from Market, shown at the 1859 Salon.

  9. Claude Monet to Eugène Boudin, June 3, 1859, in Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet: Vie et oeuvre (Lausanne: La Bibliothèque des Arts, 1974), 1:419: “un ciel magnifique . . . beaucoup de movement, de vent dans les nuages: les vaches, les chiens sont de toute beauté.”

  10. See Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405.

  11. Mantz, “Troyon,” 406: “C’est là un superbe Troyon, largement conçu, vigoureusement executé, et tout plein de cette vitalité luxuriante que le maître donnait à ses animaux comme à ses brins d’herbe.”

  12. Albert Wolff, Exposition de Peinture: Cent Chefs-D’Œuvre des Collections Parisiennes, exh. cat (Paris: Imprimerie Pillet et Dumoulin, 1883), 101, as Pâturage de la Touraine, près Château-Lavallière.

Technical Entry
Technical entry forthcoming.

Documentation
Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen with Meghan L. Gray, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle, with Meghan L. Gray. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Provenance

provenance

Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen with Meghan L. Gray, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle, with Meghan L. Gray. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Maurice Cottier (1822–1881), Paris, by 1865–1881 [1];

Inherited by his wife, Jenny Cottier (née Conquéré de Monbrison, 1828–1903), Saint-Avertin, France, 1881–at least 1889 [2];

Alexander Young (1828–1907), Blackheath, London, by July 24, 1906 [3];

Jointly owned by Alexander Young and Thomas Agnew and Sons, London, July 24, 1906–June 30, 1910 [4];

Purchased at Catalogue of The Very Important Collection of Modern Pictures and Water-Colour Drawings chiefly of the Barbizon and Dutch Schools, being the third and remaining portion of The Celebrated Collection of Alexander Young, Esq. (Deceased), Christie, Manson, and Woods, London, June 30, 1910, lot 116, as Vaches Au Pâturage, by Thomas Agnew and Sons, stock no. 3422, as Vaches au Pâturage, June 30, 1910–July 9, 1912 [5];

Purchased from Agnew by Thomas McLean’s Gallery, London, July 9, 1912 [6];

With Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, stock no. 2237, by October 22, 1919;

Purchased from Galerie Georges Petit by Knoedler and Co., London, stock book 3, no. 6529, and New York, stock book 6, no. 14864, as Pâturage de la Touraine, près Chateau Lavalliere, October 22, 1919–December 1920 [7];

Purchased from Knoedler and Co. by John William R. (1868–1939) and Mabel Nast (1871–1965) Crawford, New Rochelle, NY, December 1920–November 1921;

Returned by Mrs. Crawford to Knoedler and Co., New York, stock book 7 and sales book 12, no. 15275, November 1921–January 22, 1931 [8];

Purchased from Knoedler by Findlay Galleries, Kansas City, MO, January 22, 1931 [9];

Purchased from Findlay Galleries by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1931.

Notes

[1] An engraving after the painting was published in Troyon’s obituary in the May 1865 issue of the Gazette des Beaux-Art. The article lists the painting as being in Cottier’s collection. See Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405–06. The painting hung in Cottier’s Parisian hôtel on the rue de la Baume; see Paul Mantz, “La Galerie De M. Maurice Cottier,” Gazette des Beaux-arts (1872): 392–93.

[2] When Maurice Cottier died on November 9, 1881, he left all of his property to his wife, with the exception of six paintings destined for the Musée du Louvre after her death. See “6e Observation: Décès de M. Cottier, Son Testament; Etat Liquidatif de la Succession de M. Maurice Cottier, 13 mai 1882 et actes à suite [jusqu’au ] 20 octobre 1883,” unpaginated, MC/ET/XVIII/1678, Archives nationales, Paris. Thanks to Glynnis N. Stevenson, project assistant, NAMA, for performing this research. In 1889, multiple newspapers announced this bequest from Cottier’s collection to the Louvre, and they included a painting by Troyon entitled Pâturage de la Touraine, près Château-Lavillière that seems to match the Nelson-Atkins picture. See, for example, “Dernières Nouvelles,” Le Temps, no. 10364 (September 21, 1889). However, the painting is not listed in Maurice Cottier’s will, nor is there a Troyon painting currently in the collection of the Musée du Louvre or the Musée d’Orsay that fits this description. It seems likely that the newspapers cited the Troyon by mistake, and it was retained by Mme Cottier.

[3] Alexander Young was a Scottish-born, London-based accountant and art collector. He may have owned and lent the painting to the 1893 exhibition 13th Annual Whitechapel Fine Art Exhibition at St. Jude’s School in Whitechapel, London. See “French Pictures in the East End,” New York Herald , no. 20.667 (March 22, 1893): 1, cited as “striking examples by Troyon.” No exhibition catalogue has been located to confirm which paintings these were.

[4] On July 24, 1906, Young entered into a contract with Thomas Agnew and Sons, with the firm buying “one undivided moiety” of Young’s paintings and drawings. In law, a “moiety title” is the ownership of part of a property. Young and his executors would retain the other moiety. The Nelson-Atkins picture is listed in Schedules A and B as the Troyon painting entitled “Vache au Pâturage (large).” See “Alexander Young Esq and Mess rs Thos Agnew & Sons Agreement,” July 24, 1906; “Schedule A of Pictures;” and “Schedule B of Pictures,” National Gallery Archives, London, NGA 27/32/5/16–17 LAP/2–3.

The contract allowed for the paintings to remain in Young’s Blackheath house until Agnew found buyers. When Young died on August 15, 1907, his executors and administrators continued in the agreement on his behalf.

Although no mention is made of Messrs. Wallis and Son in this contract, the London Times reported that Wallis was also a purchaser of Young’s collection; see “The Alexander Young Collection,” Times (London), no. 38,086 (July 31, 1906): 12.

According to Frances Fowle, sometime after Young’s death, Agnew divided Young’s collection into three parts, the first two of which were sold to private buyers on both sides of the Atlantic. The third part was eventually auctioned at Christie’s on June 30, 1910. See “Alexander Young 1829–1907,” in Frances Fowle, Impressionism and Scotland (Edinburgh: National Galleries of Scotland, 2008), 136. The Troyon painting was sold on the first day of the 1910 sale.

[5] Agnew and Sons bought the painting from the sale they organized, probably indicating that they purchased Young’s share and took sole ownership of the painting.

[6] See Thomas Agnew and Sons, Picture Stock Book, 1909–1919, The National Gallery, London, NGA27/1/1/11. The stock book lists “T. McLean (E. Cremetti)” as purchasers. Eugène Cremetti (d. 1927), a London-based dealer, purchased the prestigious Thomas McLean’s Gallery around 1908.

[7] Knoedler sent the painting from its London branch to its New York branch on October 27, 1919. See Knoedler and Co. records, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, stock book 3, p. 20, no. 6529; and stock book 6, p. 210, no. 14864.

[8] See Knoedler and Co. records, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, sales book 12, p. 39, and stock book 7, p. 24, no. 15275.

[9] See Knoedler and Co. records, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, stock book 8, p. 6, no. 15275.

Related Works
Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Constant Troyon, A Cowherdess in a Summer Landscape, 1863, oil on panel, 11 x 14 1/8 in. (28 x 36 cm), illustrated in 19th Century European Paintings (Amsterdam: Sotheby’s, October 16, 2007), 55.

Constant Troyon, Cattle and Sheep, ca. 1850–1865, oil on panel, 13 3/8 x 18 7/8 in. (34 x 48 cm), National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, NGI.4281.

Constant Troyon, Cattle in Stormy Weather, 1857, oil on mahogany panel, 15 3/4 x 23 in. (40 x 58.3 cm), The Wallace Collection, London, P359.

Constant Troyon, A White and Red Ox, ca. 1853, oil on panel, 18 1/4 x 21 3/4 in. (46.4 x 55.3 cm), illustrated in The Valuable Paintings Collected by the Late Dr. Leslie D. Ward (New York: American Art Galleries, January 13, 1911).

Reproductions
Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Louis-Hippolyte Mouchot (1846–1893) and Noël-Eugène Sotain (1816–1874), after Constant Troyon, La Prairie, 1865, wood engraving, dimensions unknown, illustrated in Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405.

Alfred-Alexandre Delauney (1830–1895), after Constant Troyon, Pasturage in the Touraine near Chateau La Valliere, ca. 1883, etching, plate: 9 x 11 3/8 in. (22.9 x 28.9 cm), New England Art Exchange, Peterborough, NH.

Exhibitions
Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Cent Chefs d’Œuvres des Collections Parisiennes, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, opened June 12, 1883, no. 96, as Pâturage de la Touraine, près Château-la-Vallière.

Possibly 13th Annual Whitechapel Fine Art Exhibition, St. Jude’s School House, Whitechapel, London, opened March 22, 1893, no cat.

Exhibition in Conjunction with the Consumers Cooperative Association’s 30th Annual Meeting, Municipal Auditorium, Kansas City, MO, December 2–5, 1958, no. cat.

The Rise of Landscape Painting in France: Corot to Monet, The Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, NH, January 29–April 28, 1991; IBM Gallery of Science and Art, New York, July 30–September 28, 1991; Dallas Museum of Art, November 10, 1991–January 5, 1992; High Museum of Art, Atlanta January 28–March 29, 1992, no. 113, as Pasture in the Touraine.

Impressionist France: Visions of Nation from Le Gray to Monet, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, October 19, 2013–February 9, 2014; Saint Louis Museum of Art, March 16–July 6, 2014, no. 68, as Cattle Pasture in the Touraine.

References

references

Citation

Chicago:

Danielle Hampton Cullen, “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation in French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City: The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023), https://doi.org/10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

MLA:

Hampton Cullen, Danielle. “Constant Troyon, Cattle Pasture in the Touraine, 1853,” documentation. French Paintings and Pastels, 1600–1945: The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2023. doi: 10.37764/78973.5.534.4033.

Paul Mantz, “Troyon,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 18 (May 1, 1865): 405–06, (repro.), as La Prairie.

Paul Mantz, “La Galerie De M. Maurice Cottier” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 5 (May 1, 1872): 392–93.

Exposition de Peinture: Cent Chefs-D’Œuvre des Collections Parisiennes, exh. cat. (Paris: Imprimerie Pillet et Dumoulin, 1883), 101, as Pâturage de la Touraine, près Château-Lavillière.

F[rançois]-G[uillaume] Dumas, ed., Annuaire Illustré des Beaux-Arts et Catalogue Illustré de L’Exposition Nationale; Revue Artistique Universelle (Paris: Librairie d’Art, L[udovic] Baschet, 1883), 267.

Albert Wolff, Cent Chefs-D’Œuvre: The Choice of the French Private Galleries (New York: Knoedler, 1883), 106, 119, (repro.), as Pasturage in the Touraine, near Château-Lavallière.

“Nouvelles Diverses,” Journal des débats politiques et litteraires (September 21, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Dernières Nouvelles,” Le Temps, no. 10364 (September 21, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Gazette du Jour,” La Justice, no. 3538 (September 21, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Nos Informations,” Le Soir, no. 7364 (September 21, 1889): 2, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Au Musée du Louvre,” La Petite République Française, no. 4910 (September 22, 1889): 2, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Beaux-Arts,” L’Intransigeant, no. 3357 (September 22, 1889): 3, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Échos,” La Soleil, no. 26 (September 22, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Échos et Nouvelles,” La République Française, no. 6,492 (September 22, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Échos,” Le Voltaire, no. 4096 (September 22, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Les on-dit,” Le Rappel, no. 7135 (September 22, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Informations,” Le Petit Moniteur Universel, no. 266 (September 23, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Plats du Jour,” Le Radical, no. 266 (September 23, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Hier,” La Petite Presse, no. 8512 (September 25, 1889): unpaginated, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Bulletin: Chronique de la semaine,” La Revue politique et littéraire (September 28, 1889): 415.

“La Quinzaine,” Gazette Anecdotique, Littéraire, Artistique et Bibliographique, no. 18 (September 30, 1889): 162, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

“Chronique des Musée,” La Revue des Musées, no. 49 (October 1889): 4, as Pâturage de la Touraine près Château-Lavillière.

Possibly “French Pictures in the East End,” New York Herald, no. 20.667 (March 22, 1893): 1.

Arthur Hustin, Constant Troyon (Paris: Librairie de l’art, 1893), 48, 78, as Pâturage de la Touraine.

“The Alexander Young Collection,” Times (London), no. 38,086 (July 31, 1906): 12.

Ernest G. Halton, “The collection of Mr. Alexander Young-III. Some Barbizon pictures,” International Studio 30, no. 119 (January 1907): 204, (repro.), as Vaches au pâturage.

“Obituary,” Times (London), no. 38,414 (August 17, 1907): 6.

“The Alexander Young Collection,” Times (London), no. 39,281 (May 25, 1910): 10.

Georges Pilotelle, “Les Chefs-d’oeuvre de L’Ecole de Barbizon,” L’Aurore: Litteraire, Artistque, Sociale, no. 4595 (June 6, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“The Alexander Young Collection,” Times (London), no. 39,310 (June 28, 1910): 12, as Vaches au pâturage.

Catalogue of The Very Important Collection of Modern Pictures and Water-Colour Drawings chiefly of the Barbizon and Dutch Schools, being the third and remaining portion of The Celebrated Collection of Alexander Young, Esq. (Deceased) (London: Christie, Manson and Woods, June 30, 1910), 78, (repro.), as Vaches au pâturage.

“The Alexander Young Sale,” Times (London), no. 39,313 (July 1, 1910): 11.

“Çà et là,” La Croix, no. 8867 (July 2, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Lettres, Sciences et Arts,” L’Univers, no. 15.251 (July 2, 1910): 4, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Nouvelles de L’Ètranger,” Le Temps, no. 17900 (July 2, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

Le Progrès de la Somme, no. 12577 (July 3, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Échos,” Le Soleil, no. 185 (July 4, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Informations,” Le Journal, no. 6491 (July 5, 1910): 2, as Vaches au pâturage.

“The Alexander Young Sale,” Times (London), no. 39,316 (July 5, 1910): 13, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Les Nouvelles,” Journal de la Manche et de la Basse-Normandie, no. 683 (July 6, 1910): 3, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Petites Nouvelles des Lettres et des Arts,” Comœdia, no. 1010 (July 6, 1910): 2, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Échos et Nouvelles,” Supplement L’Abeille de Fontainebleau, no. 27 (July 8, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Auction Sales in London and Paris,” American Art News 8, no. 33 (July 16, 1910): 2, as Vâches au Pâturage.

“La Collection Young est enfin dispersée,” New York Herald: Supplément d’Art, no. 26,991 (July 17, 1910): S1–2, (repro.), as Vaches au pâturage.

La Gazette de France, no. 279 (July 18, 1910): unpaginated, as Vaches au pâturage.

“The Last of the Alexander Young Collection,” International Studio 41, no. 161 (July 1910): 50, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Mouvement des Arts,” La Chronique des Arts et de la Curiosité, no. 28 (August 13, 1910): 224, as Vaches au pâturage.

“Chief Pictures and Drawings Sold,” American Art News 8, no. 35 (September 17, 1910): 2, as Vaches au Pâturage.

“Art Sales of the Season,” Art Journal, no. 72 (1910): 310, as Vaches au pâturage.

“The Young Collection,” Art Journal, no. 72 (1910): 222, 224, (repro.), as Vaches au pâturage.

Clive Bell, “Barbizon,” Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 47, no. 272 (November 1925): vii, 257, 345, (repro.), as Cattle and Sheep.

H. C. Marillier, Christie’s: 1766–1925 (London: Constable, 1926), 128–29, as Vaches au Pâturage.

M[inna] K. P[owell], “Art: Crowds Filled Art Institute Gallery Yesterday for the First of Season’s Exhibitions—Paintings for Nelson Gallery Attract Most Attention,” Kansas City Times 93, no. 239 (October 6, 1930): 10, as Pasturage de la Touraine.

“Four More Art Works,” Kansas City Times 94, no. 78 (April 1, 1931): 12.

“Dine with Art Trustees: Institute Board Bids Others to Annual Meeting Tonight,” Kansas City Times 94, no. 81 (April 4, 1931): 2.

“Four More Art Works: New Purchases Increase Nelson Gallery Treasures to 40,” Kansas City Times (April 5, 1931): clipping, Scrapbook, vol. 1, p. 60, NAMA Archives.

“Newly Acquired Masterpieces to be Added to the Nelson Gallery Collection,” Kansas City Star 51, no. 207 (April 12, 1931): 8, (repro.), as Pasturage in the Touraine near Chateau Levalleris [sic].

“Feel the Value of Art: Picture to be in the Nelson Gallery Attract Visitors,” Kansas City Times 94, no. 152 (June 26, 1931): 2.

“What to See In Kansas City: A guide to principal Points of Interest Presented in the Style of A Baedeker,” Kansas City Star 52, no. 101 (December 27, 1931): 3C, as Pasturage.

“Nelson Gallery of Art Special Number,” Art Digest 8, no. 5 (December 1, 1933): 22, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

“The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Kansas City Special Number,” Art News 32, no. 10 (December 9, 1933): 28, 30, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

Paul V. Beckley, “Art News,” Kansas City Journal-Post 80, no. 193 (December 17, 1933): 2C.

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 51, (repro.), as Pasturage in the Touraine.

A. J. Philpott, “Kansas City Now in Art Center Class: Nelson Gallery, Just Opened, Contains Remarkable Collection of Paintings, Both Foreign and American,” Boston Sunday Globe 125, no. 14 (January 14, 1934): 16.

“Fortunes in the Sale Room,” Times (London), no. 47,047 (April 25, 1935): 9.

“Constant Troyon ‘Pasturage in the Touraine’,” Kansas City Star 61, no. 250 (May 25, 1941): 12D, (repro.), as Pasturage in the Touraine.

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 2nd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1941), 168, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

“An Exhibit of Paintings,” Kansas City Times 121, no. 289 (December 4, 1958): 9, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 261, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

Algernon Graves, Art Sales from Early in the Eighteenth Century to Early in the Twentieth Century (Mostly Old Masters and Early English Pictures) (New York: Burt Franklin, 1970), 3:218, as Vaches au Pâturage.

Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 1, Art of the Occident, 5th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 259, as Pasturage in the Touraine.

Kermit S. Champa, The Rise of Landscape Painting in France: Corot to Monet, exh. cat. (Manchester, NH: Currier Gallery of Art, 1991), 222, 225, 230, (repro.), as Pasture in the Touraine.

[Emmanuel] Bénézit, Dictionary of Artists (Paris: Éditions Gründ, 2006), 13:1218, as Cattle at Pasture.

Simon Kelly and April M. Watson, Impressionist France: Visions of Nation from Le Gray to Monet, exh. cat. (Saint Louis, MO: Saint Louis Art Museum, 2013), 200, (repro.), as Cattle Pasture in the Touraine.

Catherine Futter et al., Bloch Galleries: Highlights from the Collection of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2016), 39, (repro.), as Cattle Pasture in the Touraine.

Lauren Kroiz, Cultivating Citizens: The Regional Work of Art in the New Deal Era (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2018), 148–49, (repro.), as Cattle Pasture in the Touraine.