Collections: European Art: Parisian Rag Pickers

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Parisian Rag Pickers

In the 1870s Raffaëlli focused his Realist sensibilities on painting a marginalized underclass, people rendered homeless by the effort in the mid-nineteenth century to transform Paris into a modern city of broad boulevards. Scavenging debris from streets and building sites by night, ragpickers disregarded the norms of bourgeois society. With their gathering sacks at the ready, the shabby pair in this painting traverses the barren, snow-covered terrain of the new borderlands between Paris and the expanding suburbs.

Artist: Jean-François Raffaëlli, French, 1850-1924
Medium: Oil and oil crayon on board set into cradled panel
Place Made: France
Dates: ca. 1890
Dimensions: 12 7/8 x 10 5/8 in. (32.7 x 27 cm) (show scale)
Signature: Lower left: "J.F. RAFFAËLLI"
Collections:European Art
Museum Location: This item is not on view
Accession Number: 10.88
Credit Line: Gift of Henry C. Lawrence
Rights Statement: No known copyright restrictions
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Caption: Jean-François Raffaëlli (French, 1850-1924). Parisian Rag Pickers, ca. 1890. Oil and oil crayon on board set into cradled panel, 12 7/8 x 10 5/8 in. (32.7 x 27 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Henry C. Lawrence, 10.88
Image: overall, 10.88_SL1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph
"CUR" at the beginning of an image file name means that the image was created by a curatorial staff member. These study images may be digital point-and-shoot photographs, when we don't yet have high-quality studio photography, or they may be scans of older negatives, slides, or photographic prints, providing historical documentation of the object.

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Not every record you will find here is complete. More information is available for some works than for others, and some entries have been updated more recently. Records are frequently reviewed and revised, and we welcome any additional information you might have.

gatherers [x]		ramasseurs [x]
cold [x]		snow [x]
glaneur [x]		beard [x]
older people [x]		rag [x]
hat [x]		tired [x]
gray [x]		subsisting [x]
gleaners [x]		pinafore [x]
puppet [x]		wainscotting [x]
doll [x]		monkey [x]
broken toy [x]		work [x]
walking [x]		deserted [x]
chiffonnier [x]		poor [x]
peasants [x]		european [x]

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Tags by Posse members

RajArumugam (2)
- ramasseurs
- gatherers
Pops (11)
- rag
- subsisting
- snow
- older people
- tired
- gray
- cold
- beard
- hat
- gleaners
- glaneur
hynek (6)
- monkey
- wainscotting
- puppet
- pinafore
- broken toy
- doll
not_here (2)
- work
- walking
Egg (3)
- poor
- chiffonnier
- deserted
shelley (1)
- peasants

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