Paysans en Marche 1605 - 1650

Jean Morin made this print, Paysans en Marche, sometime in the mid-17th century. The image is an etching of a group of peasants walking along a country path in France, accompanied by a donkey. We see the rise of landscape art in the 17th century as it was increasingly seen as a worthy subject in its own right, rather than just a backdrop for other scenes. But this idyllic image of the countryside masks the realities of peasant life at the time. Rural communities in France were dealing with poverty, famine, and the ever-increasing demands of the aristocracy. Morin’s image has an element of fantasy about it, an imagined view of an untroubled rural existence. The history of landscape art is tied to social and economic history. To understand it better, we need to look at estate records, agricultural data, and other primary sources to get a sense of the social context from which it emerged.