Discovering The Gleaners by Jean-Francois Millet

 

I am in the process of organizing and listing my auction winnings from THE BIG ONE. I always like to do a little research on each item before listing them. A little study of art history in this case. I bought the prints and paintings in lots but the auctioneer pointed out this one as “A print of the gleaners”. It looked vaguely familiar but the title is what caught my attention. So I googled “the gleaners”. and found a copy of the image with the name of the artist Jean-Francois Millet. Then I did a search on his name and found the following information.

~ HISTORY ~
"Jean-François Millet (October 4, 1814 – January 20, 1875) was a French painter and one of the founders of the Barbizon school in rural France. Millet is noted for his scenes of peasant farmers; he can be categorized as part of the naturalism and realism movements.
This is one of the most well known of Millet's paintings, The Gleaners (1857). While Millet was walking the fields around Barbizon, one theme returned to his pencil and brush for seven years—gleaning—the centuries-old right of poor women and children to remove the bits of grain left in the fields following the harvest.”

Another interesting tidbit that was included was this
”The painting can be seen hanging on the wall of Sheriff Andy Taylor's house in many episodes of the original Andy Griffith Show." All information gleaned from Wikepedia

I’ve been experimenting with setting up different still lifes to showcase my shop listings. I gleaned a bit of oats from our fields for this picture. I hope you enjoy, isn’t art interesting?

This antique print is currently listed in my Etsy shop Metaphor Alchemy here:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/113446203/the-gleaners-vintage-framed-print-jean

Auction Winnings - THE BIG ONE

 A couple of weeks ago I attended an auction. I enjoy the thrill of the hunt but most times can control my buying impulses. In fact, the last two times I had attended this auction house I left without a single winning bid. Well, except for some empty boxes to use as packing since they are available for FREE. Somehow all the conditions were right and I had the opportunity for winning bids on a large amount of items. A HUGELY ENORMOUS LARGE amount of items. I had to call my husband to come and help. We filled his pickup truck and my car. WHAT WAS I THINKING!!!

You probably are wondering what possible conditions were there for me to obtain so much. Here they are:
1. Auction with a large amount of items.
2. Large amount of similiar items.
3. Rainy weather
4. Packer football game later
5. Small buying crowd
Equals low bids.

We unpacked my husband's truck that night. I left all the items in my car for the next day. I was exhausted from the bidding adrenalin rushes and the loading and unloading. Above is a couple of pictures showing a portion of my purchases. I ended up with a lot of antique and vintage maps, prints, and original paintings. Now I need to organize them, find a place to put everything other than in our garage. Find out what I actually bought since many of the items were sold in lots. Plus there are many other items.
Next the items need to be cleaned and in some cases repaired. Countless photo shoots, research, listing. Then hopefully packing if I sell any of it in my Etsy shops or eBay. WHAT WAS I THINKING!!! There will be more posts to come as I go through my purchases from THE BIG ONE.

Metaphor Alchemy – Etsy Shop

 

Shipping day for my Etsy shop Metaphor Alchemy. Something for me to aspire to,  x 5 per week. I do enjoy wrapping the packages in brown paper bags, tying them with twine and adding tags with a key for creativity. Time to get back to work…