An atmospheric 19th-century oil on canvas depicting a rural scene with chickens, cottages and a woman washing linens.

A worn pathway winds between two buckled trees and leads onto open pasture where several chickens peck the earth. While, in the foreground, a woman dressed in a blue dress with a white apron is kneeling by a pond and washing laundry.

Stylistically, the painting fits with the approach taken by the Barbizon school of artists who were active between 1830-1870. These were some of the first to truly embrace painting outdoors and they’re seen as a precursor to the French impressionists. Many of their works were created in the forest of Fontainebleau near the village of Barbizon.

The artist, Jules-Louis Dusaussay (b. 1828), was trained by the great landscape painter, Louis Cabat (1812-1893), and is known to have exhibited at the illustrious Paris salon in 1864.