Transcript of Greatest Paintings: The French Revolution - Millet's Angelus New

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Hello, everyone. Tom Holland here, and I am joined by the great Laura Cumming, and we are looking at Painting in History. Four paintings that reflect a particular period in history. We'll be looking at the history of the painting itself, the life of the artist, and teasing out the mysteries that shadow all four paintings. Today, we will be looking at the Angelus by Jean-François Millet, mid-19th century painting. Is it an expression of French Catholicism? Is it an expression of French Jacqueminism? Could it possibly be both? That is the mystery we will be exploring today.

Hello, everyone.

Welcome back to our series on Great Paintings from History. Today, we have arrived at the final painting in our series. With me, as she has been throughout our previous three episodes in this series, is Laura Cumming. Laura, today's painting, we're in mid-19th century France. What is the painting? Who's it by? What's going on?

The painting is The Angelus, painted in 1859 by Jean-François Millet, who is, I always think, rather amazingly, he spelt M-I-L-L-L-E-T, like Millet, and R-Millet is spelt M-I-L-L-L-E L-A-I-S. I don't know. It's strange. Very confusing. It's very confusing. I wanted us to look at this painting because it was and is still, I think, in La France Profonde, the most famous image of devotion in French art, but it's also, for a very long period, the most popular painting in France. It comes a bit like the Skating Minister in Scotland. It comes to represent the French to the French.

There's a certain idea of France that is quite a controversial idea by the mid-19th century.

Now, if you don't know the painting, let me just say it's a small painting. It shows us two figures who are standing stocks still, heads bent in prayer. Their bodies are a haloed backlit by this golden evening rays across an immense field. They have been digging potatoes. You can see unearthed potatoes, not very clear, around their clogged feet.

It's a It's a man and a woman, isn't it?

It's a man and a woman. And away in the distance is a tin tack of blue spire beneath high pink clouds. It's twilight. What you are seeing in this painting is the moment at which the bells from that spire are ringing out across the landscape to call people on the land to prayer. Hence the title of the painting, The Angelus, which is the prayer, which in these pre-industrial days where we don't We have yet watches and clocks and so on, this happens three times a day, and it marks the span of the day, sunset, noon, and dusk. Do you know the prayer?

Basically, it's about Gabriel bringing the news that Mary is to bear Christ. There are three introductions, and then you go into the Hale Mary. It's an expression of Catholic faith, Catholic devotion. We are half a century and more after the French Revolution. The French Revolution, of course, was very anticlerical. The issue of the relationship of the idea of France to Catholicism and what the role should be for the Church relative to the secular has been a massively live political issue in France since the Revolution. It's not a neutral painting, is it?

It is not a neutral painting at all. And yet, seeing the painting in reality, it's currently hanging here in London in a little show about Millet. It hasn't been seen in London for a very, very long time. It's usually in the Musée Dorset in Paris. What you see when you're standing in front of it is not the great swelling political controversy which surrounded it and certainly brought it huge fame. It's this meditative slowness. The man's taken his hat off and you can see the imprint of the hat in his hair as if he wears it all the time. The woman's apron is getting a little bit of last glowing light on it. The figures are, as always with Milo, the figures are very softly painted, very gentle. They've got this terribly hard job. They're trying to scrape a living by digging up potatoes. It's probably, we think, late September. It's certainly that hour of the day. I mean, art historians, as always, like to give us the exact day and the exact time and so on. But I think it's certainly probably around about 6: 00 or 7: 00 in September. What I feel, and it has often been said about it, and it rings ho-ho true for me, is that what you see is what you are hearing.

You hear the sound of the bells coming out across the landscape and the stillness. That ringing is coming from so far away, yet it stops them in their tracks and they bend their heads to pray.

Thank you for listening. Subscribe to therestishistoryclub@therestishistory. Com for the entire episode. And not only the entire episode, you can hear all four episodes in the series. So unbelievable value. Rush away and sign up.

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