"Nothing Doing" by Jules Bastien-Lepage (1848-1884)

Nothing Doing (Pas Mèche)

Jules Bastien-Lepage (1848-1884)

1882

Oil on canvas

132.10 x 89.50 cm (framed: 171.20 x 126.70 x 14.20 cm)

Scottish National Gallery

NG 1133

Purchased 1913

The gallery note explains that the boy's whip and horn would have been used for controlling barge-horses. [Commentary continues below.]

Image download, text and formatting by Jacqueline Banerjee.

See the gallery website for conditions of use. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

With ill-fitting clothes and shoes, fraying sleeves and cuff, and a pale face, the barge-boy looks at us without self-consciousness or curiosity. Caught in a moment of idleness, he is who he is. Detail (the horn, for example, or the back-gardens glimpsed int e background, are mixed with blended impressions of the stony, weedy path in the foreground. William S. Feldman writes:

The series of immensely popular genre themes that Bastien-Lepage produced until his untimely death in December 1884 earned him an influence comparable to Manet, some sixteen years his senior. For a younger generation of painters disenchanted with the excesses of both conservative and radical camps, the "juste milieu" approach of Bastien-Lepage represented the viable alternative. Consequently, a school of Bastien-Lepage followers emerged virtually overnight, attracting practitioners from France, Great Britain, and throughout Europe.

Related Material

Bibliography

Feldman, William S. "Jules Bastien-Lepage: a new perspective." Art Journal 20. NGV (National Gallery of Victoria): Web. 12 March 2020.

Jules Bastien-LepagePas Mèche (Nothing Doing). National Galleries of Scotland. Web. 12 March 2020.

Created 12 March 2020