Stroll of the Convalescent (La promenade du convalescent) 

Alphonse Legros created this etching called ‘Stroll of the Convalescent’ in nineteenth-century France. This image shows a man and a woman walking together in a landscape. The work is suggestive of broader social and cultural anxieties around illness and recovery in nineteenth-century France. We can see the figure of the ‘convalescent’ as a representation of the social vulnerability and precarity experienced by many at the time. Notice how the woman supports the man. This could point towards contemporary ideals of caregiving and gender roles. The natural environment surrounding them – the tall trees, the path – becomes symbolic of healing and escape from the pressures of urban life. Understanding the social context in which Legros was working is crucial to interpreting this work. His other prints focused on working-class people and peasants. These works engaged with the tradition of social realism which aimed to portray the realities of modern life with an emphasis on the lives of ordinary people. The Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris holds a large collection of these prints and drawings, and these enable us to place Legros’ work in its proper social and institutional context.