Uprooted Tree at Olevano Romano

La Bouëre had already begun exhibiting at the Paris Salon when, in 1831, he embarked on a four-year sojourn in Italy. He painted this study on November 16, 1833, at Olevano Romano, about thirty miles east of Rome. The subject was a standard part of the aspiring landscape painter's repertoire, but this example is especially remarkable for its brio; the truncated limbs contribute to the expressive power of the unwieldy form.

Credit: Thaw Collection, Jointly Owned by The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Morgan Library & Museum, Gift of Eugene V. Thaw, 2009