Landscape Narcisse Virgilio Diaz de la Peña

Born to Spanish parents, the artist studied porcelain painting in Sèvres. In the 1830s he came in contact with a group of landscape painters working in Barbizon. His favourite subjects were shady woods and the contrast of the sun shining through the clouds and from behind the dark foliage of the trees. In the picture, at the foot of an enormous silhouette of the trees, the small figure of a brushwood collector is seen, emphasising the harmony between man and nature. Like many of his fellow painters, Diaz – similarly to Munkácsy in his first period of art – used bitumen to ground the canvas, resulting in the gradual darkening of the colours and the partial loss of nuances in tone.

Ferenc Tóth