Discussion- song of the lark.
In Book II, chapter 2 of Cather’s The Song of the Lark, Thea, after having moved to Chicago, finally visits the Art Institute. After observing several oeuvres, she finds herself particularly taken by Jules Breton’s “The Song of the Lark.”
This 1884 painting was, in fact, one of the Art Institute of Chicago’s first acquisitions and faced the jeopardy of permanent removal by the artistic director at the time. For more on this interesting backstory, please listen to the following audio file:
https://www.artic.edu/assets/93d0e3a0-ab3c-decf-38da-5e9b2581a276
One of the criticisms of this painting is similar to a criticism of Realism’s Local Colorist writings. The painting, realistic as it appears, seems to romanticize the incredible hard work of a field worker; it makes the peasant girl’s toil in the fields look beautiful. Similarly, the Local Colorists, through realistic depiction, romanticized the abandoned rural villages and deserted seaside towns, lending to an unnecessary sentimentality unpopular at the time.
Of particular note with regard to this one-time most famous of American paintings is that its title refers to a different medium of art: music. An auditory title is used for a visual art. In his depiction of a young peasant woman standing in the field of her labor at sunrise, not only is the song absent, but so is the lark. (Or are they?) Birds are depicted, but most do not identify these as the lark that is singing, nor as larks at all.
A few things to observe include that the peasant is a young girl, that she is captured in mid-step, that she holds a scythe, that the scythe is not fully lowered, that she is barefoot, that she walks a trodden path, that she is surrounded by fields and sky, that it is sunrise, that birds are flying overhead: https://www.artic.edu/iiif/2/da63fb3d-21ad-4e0d-6dda-bb1e0685ecdb/full/843,/0/default.jpg
What do we know from the painting—or what can we assume—about the lark’s song the peasant girl hears?
OR
In what way(s) does this painting visually depict auditory birdsong, or, the song of the lark?
Answer preview:
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