"the Haystacks" - Around 1880 - Ernest Auguste Le Villain - Corot, Lhermitte - Naturalism

Magnificent representation of a landscape at harvest time, with the bundling of wheat ears and the poetic presence of haystacks. By the hand of Ernest Le Villain, this work, circa 1880, exudes a beautiful emotion of country life and embodies "Naturalism". An artistic movement, born in the second half of the 19th century, which represented nature as it is, without emphasis, with simplicity and authenticity.

Ernest Auguste Le Vilain is a French landscape painter born in Paris in 1834 and died in the same city in 1916.
A student of Jacques Guiaud and Camille Bernier, he was encouraged in his work by Camille Corot.
Le Villain was a friend of Eugène Boudin and Stanislas Lépine with whom he shared thoughts.
He seems to have avoided galleries but he exhibited for the first time at the Paris Salon in 1870.
Salon in which he participated every year until at least 1905, thus becoming a member of the Society of French Artists.

Works preserved in the museums: municipal of Boulogne-sur-mer and Dieppe.

Oil on canvas in good condition with necessary restorations. (See back), signed “E Le Villain” lower left.
Size: 15,2 x 24,2 Inches without frame and 22,8 x 31,5 Inches with its 19th century gilded wooden frame.