William Morris Hunt: An Introduction to Millet

"The Sheep Shearers" by Millet

"At the time when William Morris Hunt felt that Couture could do no more for him, he began to be interested in the work of Jean Francois Millet. He had seen his wonderful 'Sower' in the Salon of 1852 and was greatly impressed by it. "Why don't you buy that picture?" he asked of an art dealer. "Oh! it is too sad a subject. Besides, it is not worth the three hundred francs which is asked for it." "What!" cried Hunt, "a masterpiece for sixty dollars, and you hesitate about buying it?" whereupon he went at once to the storeroom of an art dealer and became the possessor of the first painting of 'The Sower,' one of Millet's greatest works.

William Babcock, the Boston painter, who had passed most of his life in France, was probably the first American to appreciate Millet and his work. He it was who took Hunt to Barbizon, and introduced him to the great painter.

Millet was generally considered somewhat of a bear and had little to do with other French artists, except perhaps Rousseau. William Hunt came into his life like a flash of sunshine. He became attached to him and always treated him with respect. When Hunt first saw him, he found him as he expressed it, "painting in a cellar." The picture on his easel was 'The Sheep-Shearers,' exquisite in color as a Correggio and with all the pathos and grandeur of Michael Angelo. "Is that picture engaged?" inquired Hunt.

"Yes," replied Millet, "Deforge will take it for my color bill. He thinks that I shall never earn money enough to pay what I owe him, so he will take this for the debt." It is needless to add that Hunt paid the color bill and carried away the picture, after giving several commissions for work not then completed. From that time his interest in Millet increased."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "The Art-Life of William Morris Hunt" by Helen Mary Knowlton.)