Peasant Family in the Veneto Region

The painting can be identified with Peasant Family in the Veneto Region exhibited at the annual Brera exhibition of 1885 as documented by an illustration that appeared in the press at the time. In fact, there were many, often conflicting, reviews of this painting during the months of the Brera show: some critics stressed the work’s limits which mainly lay in the draughtsmanship and the handling, while others praised its naturalism that was well-rendered with subtle hues. The work unquestionably falls within the sphere of Lombard Naturalism, of which Carcano was one of the principle driving forces, but it must also be interpreted in the light of his interest in real life and its immediate social consequences, which is well evident in Break During Work on the Exhibition of 1881 (Milan, Galleria d’Arte Moderna). In the painting under examination the artist depicts a genre scene enlivened by a group of peasants in the background intent on daily tasks like spinning, while the figure in the foreground looks directly at the viewer, as if posing for a photograph. The immediacy of the scene makes this work a lively example of painting from life, and is strongly characterised by the use of light to accentuate depth and by rapid, short brushstrokes. The same pictorial style informs the researches on landscape painting conducted by Carcano at the same time in works such as Road to the Gardanelli Wood, shown at the Venice and Bologna Esposizioni Nazionali Artistiche in 1887 and 1888 respectively, or Lombard Plain, which was highly acclaimed at the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1889 (both works are in a private collection).