Angelus, Analysis of the Work by Jean-François Millet

Angelus, is the most famous work of the painter Jean-François Millet. Belonging to realism, it is one of the great masterpieces of French 19th-century painting.

This work expresses a deep sense of devotion that became one of the most widely reproduced religious paintings of the 19th century, with prints exhibited by thousands of devotees throughout France. However, Millet painted it with much nostalgia, and not just with religious sentiment.

In 1865, he admitted that the idea of producing it came to him as a result of his childhood memories of his grandmother, who always insisted that the family stop working in the fields when they heard the church bells ringing for the Angelus.

The work was supposedly commissioned by the American art collector Thomas Gold Appleton. Millet sold it in 1859 for less than 1,000 francs (approximately US $200). Thirty years later, it was sold to the Parisian philanthropist Hippolyte Chauchard, for 750,000 francs.

As the name suggests, the painting shows two rural figures - a man and a woman - who stopped working for a few minutes to recite the Angelus, a prayer (traditionally recited three times a day in Catholic countries) that commemorates the announcement. The name "Angelus", which means "angel" in Latin, is the opening word of the Annunciation: "Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae" or "the angel of the Lord announced to Mary".

In describing these two silent and anonymous figures, in the middle of a vast cultivated plain, with only a few simple tools to help them earn a living from the land, Millet highlights the desolate life of the rural worker with their daily routine of physical labor that persists throughout the seasons. At the same time, the moment of silence reminds us of an inevitable connection with the Almighty and our insignificance before him. In respect of this, we can observe that the man removed his hat and bowed his head in silent prayer, just like the woman.

The scene takes place during a harvest, in the surroundings of the village of Chailly-en-Biere, in Barbizon, whose church tower is visible in the distance. The couple was digging potatoes when they heard the church bells, and all their tools are scattered around them, including sacks, pitchfork, basket, and handcart. It is not clear what the relationship is between the couple - husband and wife, colleagues or farmer and servant. A sales catalog of 1889 described them simply as "A young peasant and his companion".

 

 MILLET AND HIS WORK

 

 Jean-François Millet was born in France on October 4, 1814. A member of the Barbizon School of Landscape Painting, Millet is best known for his rural realism, which highlighted the harsh working conditions of peasants.

His paintings were highly controversial at the time when France was still trying to heal its life after the French Revolution, although Millet was more of a humanitarian artist than a politician. In this sense, he was very different from the declared left-wing painter Gustave Courbet, whose works were notably political. However, Millet shared with Courbet the desire to honor the men and women workers of France, and his images confer a new monumentalism to their lives. For him, peasants and the countryside were part of an atemporal rural world and a unique part of French heritage. They were also closer to nature and, therefore, to God.

He died at 60 in France on January 20, 1875.