A Calling
Seated on a stone step in the countryside, a young girl has realized that her calling in life is to be an artist. Bouguereau was famous for his innovative depictions of children. In 1900 a critic wrote, "[F]ew artists have represented childhood with more tenderness, charm, and spirit than Bouguereau . . . [H]e has invented the most picturesque, the most pleasing, the most original scenes of an almost endless variety." Bouguereau was no less famous for his remarkably life-like images. Here he convincingly captures the girl's rough clothing, soft skin, and intense gaze. Bouguereau painted this work in La Rochelle, a harbor city on France's west coast. During the later years of his life, Bouguereau—by then wealthy and famous—made a habit of spending summers in La Rochelle. There the artist lived in a mansion he owned near the port, working in a greenhouse he had converted into a studio or in the countryside. While in La Rochelle, Bouguereau chose his models from among farm workers, families of local fishermen, or his own servants.
Colors in this work
Details
- Date
- 1896
- Medium
- oil on fabric
- Dimensions
- framed: height 1.32 m, width 0.99 m, depth 0.106 m; unframed: height 1.04 m, width 0.71 m
- Origin
- France, 19th century
- Department
- Modern European Painting and Sculpture
- Holding institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Palette
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Select a color to find related artworks.
- Image provider
- cleveland-museum-of-art
- License
- CC0-1.0
- Credit
- Gift of the Frances W. Ingalls Trust
Art Genome Taxonomy
10 tags
Subject Matter
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Childhood Both · 99%
The museum description identifies the subject as a young girl, and the image visibly presents a child or young adolescent figure.
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Rural Life Metadata · 97%
The catalog describes the girl as seated on a stone step in the countryside.
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Figures in Nature Visual · 96%
The figure is shown outdoors amid trees, foliage, grasses, flowers, and stone.
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Scenes of Everyday Life Visual · 93%
The girl holds a pencil over an open sketchbook, presenting drawing as the central activity.
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Eye Contact Visual · 96%
The girl turns her face toward the viewer and maintains a clear direct gaze.
Visual Qualities
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Highly Detailed Visual · 95%
The painting uses careful modeling and fine descriptive attention for the face, hands, clothing, sketchbook, stone, and vegetation.
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Earth Tones Visual · 94%
Muted greens, browns, ochers, cream, and dusty pink dominate the composition.
Medium and Techniques
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Oil Painting Metadata · 99%
The Cleveland Museum of Art identifies the medium as oil on fabric.
Time Periods
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19th Century Art Metadata · 99%
The work is dated 1896, placing it within nineteenth-century art.
Geographic Regions
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French Art Metadata · 99%
The catalog identifies Bouguereau as French and gives the place of origin as France.
Source & rights
William Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825–1905). A Calling. Cleveland Museum of Art.
High-resolution sources
- Original TIFF ↗ 5,252 × 7,780 · Cleveland Museum Of Art · Available