Ragpicker Lighting His Pipe (Chiffonnier allumant sa pipe)

~The established consensus in contemporary culture about the value of exactitude and legibility played a central part in the making, interpreting and appreciation of painting. Indeed, this process was circular, a self-fulfilling prophecy. The modern mentality set great store by precision and the document; contemporary pictures scrupulously recorded the present...

At the sixth Impressionist exhibition in 1881, Jean-François Raffaëlli showed the painting now known as The Absinthe Drinkers for the first time (fig. 81).See...