CLAUSEN, George
(b. 1852, London, d. 1944, Newbury)

The Mowers

1892
Oil on canvas, 97 x 76 cm
Usher Gallery, London

From the 1880s on, Britain's rural plein-air naturalism was tightened by the example of Bastien-Lepage and the Barbizon school. In 1883, George Clausen was in Paris for several months, working under Bouguereau at the Académie Julian. He met bastien-Lepage, and then followed his own predilection for simple, rustic scenes. Rural subjects remained to the fore in his work, and from the 1890s on he expressed them in his own version of Impressionist techniques. His post-Millet view of nature and farm work can be seen in The Mowers, which also exhibits effects of colour and light reminiscent of Monet.