Provenance
Seth Morton Vose, Boston (acquired directly from the artist)
Anthony Bamfylde
H.N. Robertson
Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, London by 1955
Eugene Thaw, New York
Private collection (acquired from the above)
Exhibited
London, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, 1955, no. 41, p. 18
London, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, 1960, no. 32, p. 15
London, Hazlitt, Gooden & Fox, 1961, no. 18, p. 12
Literature
Terence Mullaly, "The Barbizon School: II. Rousseau," Apollo, August 1955, pp. 46-47, fig. 1, illustrated (as The Valley)
Michael Schulman, Théodore Rousseau, Catalogue Raisonné de l’œuvre peint, Vol. II, Paris, Les Éditions de l’Amateur, 1999, p. 96, no. 43, illustrated.
Catalogue note
Théodore Rousseau was eighteen years old in June 1830 when he set out for a six-month trip to France’s Auvergne region. Very remote and sparsely populated, with a topography identified by its carved volcanic mountain formations, cascading waterfalls and deep, sloping valleys, Rousseau’s choice to go to the Auvergne, his first voyage as a young painter, marked the beginning of his Emersonian interest in nature with all its mysteries, and the start of a philosophy that would come to define him as a landscape painter.
In discussing Rousseau’s Auvergne landscapes, the late art historian, Robert Herbert noted in his landmark study on the history of Barbizon painting, “These [Rousseau’s] extraordinary compositions of rushing mountain torrents, rocky escarpments and wild valleys were painted with an energetic brushwork and heightened color that make us think today of the expressionist styles of the early twentieth century.” (Robert Herbert, Barbizon Revisited, New York, 1962, p. 23). One such painting, La Vallée Tournante de Thiézac Auvergne, can be found in Gallery 19C’s current inventory. However, the present work and the subject of this note, reveals yet another characteristic of Auvergne topography. Rousseau was also struck by the verdant pasturelands, areas where livestock would graze during the summer months and where small hamlets could often be seen at the foothills of the mountains. The Sunlit Valley, with its sloping hillside painted in a palette of assorted pale greens, is a good example of this more pastoral side of the Auvergne that also provided subject matter for Rousseau during his six-month sojourn in 1830.
The first owner of The Sunlit Valley was the Boston Art dealer, Seth Molton Vose (1831-1910), who purchased the painting directly from Rousseau. Vose developed a love of Barbizon painting during his lifetime and was responsible for promoting the School to collectors in Boston and New England.