Poplars, Éragny

This is a corner of Pissarro's own garden at Éragny in the summer of 1895, probably seen from his studio window. Tall poplars take up most of the upright canvas, and far back, very small, stands a single figure, a reminder of the country people who run through so much of his work. What happened to the picture next is unusually well recorded. On 22 November 1895 Pissarro sold it, with other recent canvases, to his dealer Paul Durand-Ruel. The following April Durand-Ruel hung it, simply called Poplars, in a large show of Pissarro's new work in Paris, and it stayed with the Durand-Ruel firm and family for more than 30 years. In 1927 it went to the American collector Adelaide Milton de Groot, and it came to the Metropolitan Museum with her bequest in 1967.