Route d'Ennery

In 1874 the road running north from Pontoise toward the village of Ennery went through open farmland, and Pissarro, who had been living in the town for two years, gave it a wide canvas, nearly a metre across. A light two-wheeled cart drawn by one horse carries two people along it. A man with a sack over his shoulder walks on the left, two women stand together on the right, and in front of them the road crosses a small stone bridge. Further up the slope there are more figures and a few animals under a heavy grey sky. He signed and dated it at the lower left. The picture went through an anonymous Paris sale in 1932 and later came to Max Kaganovitch, a dealer who had settled in Paris in 1924. In 1973 he and his wife Rosy gave their collection to the French state, on condition that the paintings be kept together in one room. It was accepted for the Jeu de Paume, then the Louvre's gallery of Impressionist painting, and moved to the Musée d'Orsay in 1986.