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A Child with an Apple

Image credit: The National Gallery, London

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A little boy or girl leans on a cushion holding an apple. The child is positioned in the extreme foreground of the picture before a dark blank background, the closeness to us creating a sense of immediacy. The intense gaze of the glistening blue eyes and slightly parted lips – which Greuze has painted with great care – give the child an air of thoughtful melancholy, as well as slight unease. This is not a portrait, but a genre painting of a general type. Children shown with apples must have been a popular theme as Greuze painted lots of them. These single heads were quite profitable as they didn't take long to complete.

Such images of children reflect a growing interest in and a changing, more sentimental, perception of childhood in France at this time, with a new fashion for children of wealthy families to be raised by their own mothers rather than servants.

The National Gallery, London

London

Title

A Child with an Apple

Date

late 18th century

Medium

Oil on canvas

Measurements

H 40.6 x W 32.1 cm

Accession number

NG1020

Acquisition method

Wynn Ellis Bequest, 1876

Work type

Painting

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Normally on display at

The National Gallery, London

Trafalgar Square, London, Greater London WC2N 5DN England

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