Gustave Courbet's Stone Breakers: Realism And The Realist

The nineteenth century was an active age of economic, social and political revolution. Momentous scientific advances began to be invented, such as iron and steel, the telegraph and telephone, and the steam engine. Due to these advances, Europe as a whole began to transition from a predominantly agrarian society to and industrial based one. The rise of factories called for countless workers and overall eventually led to worker’s rights becoming citizen rights. Industrialization and urbanization also put emphasis on class distinction. Conflicts between these different classes of society were often implied in works of art. This direct observation of society and nature became the basis of the Realism art movement. Instead of illuminating imagination
Through its iconography, Courbet reveals socialist ideas and a concern for the plight of the poor. Stone Breakers depicts two workers in tattered clothing, a man breaking up stones with a hammer and a young boy lifting a basket filled with stones. Standing at 5ft.3 in. x 8 ft. 6in., it portrayed ordinary people on a monumental scale, which at the time seemed crude to critics. Courbet did not mean it to be heroic in any way, yet meant it to be an accurate account of the abuse and deprivation that was common feature of mid-cenury French rural life (Gersh-Nesic). In terms of formalism, his brushwork is quite rough as he pays attention to all areas in the foreground equally. Great contrast is created due to the lack of emphasis on the landscape and the significantly lit elements of the foreground. Stone Breakers was unfortunately destroyed during
It depicts a dark and grimy tightly crowded railroad car full of anonymous working class men and women. Shabbily dressed, the passengers are slumped slightly over seemingly submissive to their situation in life and the severity of the period’s economic reality. This oil painting is formally made up of dark sketchy outlines and textured surfaces. The profound contrast between lights and darks create clear edges in opposition to the looser brushwork elsewhere. This in a way helps to convey the hardship of the subjects’ daily life. The fact that this scene is set in a railroad car also exemplifies the use of new industrial subject matter of the nineteenth century