The Song of the Lark (painting)

The Song of the Lark is an 1884 oil on canvas painting by French naturalist artist Jules Breton. It is part of the Henry Field Memorial Collection at the Art Institute of Chicago.[1]

The Song of the Lark
ArtistJules Breton
Year1884 (1884)
MediumOil on canvas
SubjectFarming, sun
Dimensions110.6 cm × 85.8 cm (43.5 in × 33.75 in)
LocationArt Institute of Chicago
Accession1894.1033
Websitewww.artic.edu/artworks/94841/the-song-of-the-lark

The painting shows a peasant farm girl walking in a field transfixed, listening to birdsong at dawn.

At the Century of Progress, the 1934 Chicago World's Fair, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt unveiled The Song of the Lark as the winner of the Chicago Daily News contest to find the "most beloved work of art in America". She declared it her personal favorite painting,[2] saying "At this moment The Song of the Lark had come to represent the popular American artistic taste on a national level."[3]

Willa Cather's 1915 novel The Song of the Lark takes its name from the painting, which is also used as the novel's cover art.

In February 2014, actor Bill Murray said at a press event for the film, The Monuments Men, that a chance encounter with The Song of the Lark at the Art Institute of Chicago helped him in his early career when he was contemplating suicide.[4]

References
  1. Art Institute of Chicago page
  2. "Facebook page of Art Institute of Chicago". Facebook. Archived from the original on 26 February 2022.
  3. May, Cheryll (17 March 2014). A Seamless Web: Transatlantic Art in the Nineteenth Century edited by Cheryll May. ISBN 978-1-4438-5747-5.
  4. Video on YouTube
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