Detail of The Curious Little Girl by Corot in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, November 2009

Artist: Camille Corot (French, 1796–1875)

Title: The Curious Little Girl

Date: 1860–64

Medium: Oil on wood

Dimensions: 16 1/4 x 11 1/4 in. (41.3 x 28.6 cm)

Classification: Paintings

Credit Line: The Walter H. and Leonore Annenberg Collection, Gift of Walter H. and Leonore Annenberg, 1999, Bequest of Walter H. Annenberg, 2002

Accession Number: 1999.288.2

On View


Gallery Label:

In 1881, six years after Corot's death, Vincent van Gogh wrote: "Corot's figures are not as well known as his landscapes, but it cannot be denied that he has done them. Besides, Corot modeled every tree trunk with the same devotion and love as if it were a figure." Perhaps it would be better to say that Corot painted people with the same devotion as trees, for in his figures one also finds the quiet absorption and unaffected grace—what the French critics called "naïveté"—with which he imbued his landscapes. Although Corot had always made figure studies, at the end of his life he painted a large number of genre scenes for eager collectors. His friends recalled that he looked forward to them as a refreshing holiday from routine. The girl here closely resembles Emma Dobigny, who later became a favorite model.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/collection_database/europe...