Hay wagon

A hay wagon makes its way through shallow water, its stack piled high with one worker seated on top and a companion riding a horse just beside it. Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot painted this unhurried country scene in 1860, showing rural work as something calm and ordinary rather than heroic. The tall tree on the right holds the composition together, while a wide, cloudy sky fills most of the canvas and lends the whole picture a soft, misty mood.

French painter Corot is often described as the link between the older classical landscape painters and the Impressionists who followed. He was happiest working outdoors, and his talent for catching light and air shows up in the feathery way he handled the leaves and clouds here. By 1860 he had settled into the gentle, silvery manner that made him famous, and his signature rests in the lower right corner. Younger artists like Monet and Pissarro admired him greatly, seeing in paintings such as this one a quiet mastery worth learning from.