Ploughing Scene

We can observe heroic physical mastery in the low angle from which animalière, or animal portraitist, Rosa Bonheur paints muscular oxen as they strain to pull a plough through the idyllic French countryside. This subject matter and treatment is characteristic of Bonheur, who was so closely associated with heroic images of oxen that a fellow artist painted her portrait alongside one. Art historian Stephanie Triplett notes that Bonheur’s gender nonconformity – she presented as masculine and partnered intimately with women – reinforced the association between herself and oxen, as most elite women of the time would have been painted with “daintier” animals such as lap dogs. Bonheur’s fascination with cattle mirrors the broader contemporaneous European interest in animal breeding. Farmers wanted to maximize the meat, milk, and strength of these animals. Artists and natural historians, including Bonheur, produced texts cataloging different animal breeds. Bonheur’s images ennoble these efforts.

The heat of the noonday sun is palpable in this painting as drooling oxen drag a plough. They are followed by a man whose face is obscured by a hat, which shields him from the bright sun, while birds peck at the furrow left in their wake. Rosa Bonheur was among the most celebrated painters of animals in the 19th century. She frequently depicted plowing scenes that highlighted her command of animal anatomy, which she studied through dissection. This scene reverses the composition of her first work to gain major celebrity: “Ploughing in the Nivernais,” which was exhibited at the Salon and won a medal in 1849. In 1857–58 Rosa Bonheur’s fame and success in the United States was secured ...