Explore the Peasant genre about the Background of this artwork.
The "peasant genre" of the Realism movement began in the 1840s with the works of Jean-François Millet, Jules Breton, and others.  Van Gogh described the works of Millet and Breton as having religious significance, "something on high," and described them as being the "voices of the wheat."The Van Gogh Museum says of Millet's influence on Van Gogh: "Millet's paintings, with their unprecedented depictions of peasants and their labors, mark a turning point in 19th-century art. Before Millet, peasant figures were just one of many elements in picturesque or nostalgic scenes. In Millet's work, individual men and women became heroic and real. Millet was the only major artist of the Barbizon School who was not interested in 'pure' landscape painting."
Jean-François Millet Peasant Realism movement peasant Jules Breton Barbizon School Van Gogh Museum