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Start at the foreground house and climb visually toward the snowy peaks. Where do hard edges dissolve into cloud?
Courbet places a dark-roofed dwelling beneath a steep mountain range in this 1874 canvas. Warm trees and buildings occupy the foreground, while snow and shadow divide the distant peaks. The close structure offers a point of entry into the view without reducing the mountains to a merely decorative backdrop.
Oil on canvas · 60 × 73 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Realism
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Details and source
- Museum title
- An Alpine Scene
- Artist
- Gustave Courbet (French, 1819–1877)
- Date
- 1874
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 60 × 73 cm (23 5/8 × 28 3/4 in.); Framed: 83.9 × 96.6 × 7.7 cm (33 × 38 × 3 in.)
- Credit line
- A. A. Munger Collection
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.