Two young women gathering reeds by the edge of some water, watching, and being watched by, two deer. Engraving by F. Bracquemond after Gustave Jundt.

Plate to: The art journal, 1874, new series vol. XIII, p. 308

"Reed-gathering. Gustave Jundt, painter. J. F. Bracquemond, engraver. "The works of the painter of this picture are less known to us than those of the engraver, M. Bracquemond, who has long acquired good reputation in his native country, France, for his etched plates, executed in a very free and masterly style of handling, yet with delicate markings of light and shade. Many of these very effective etchings have found their way into England, and have been most favourably received here. M. Gustave Jundt, who is also a Frenchman, first became known to us as an artist by two very agreeable pictures he contributed to the International Exhibition of 1862: they were called respectively 'A souvenir of the Tyrol’ and 'The first step.' In the French Gallery, Pall Mall, he exhibited, in 1866, a picture entitled : 'Wedding attire'; and this, so far as memory serves, sums up our acquaintance with the works of the painter till the subject here engraved came before us. The original, it may be presumed, is little else than a sketch, and M. Bracquemond has not attempted to make it a finished work, yet the painter's conception could scarcely have been more effectually presented had he elaborated his subject to the utmost, and had the engraver also done the same. The composition requires but little explanation, yet it seems as if the two females occupied in cutting and gathering reeds are of a type too delicately constructed for such toilsome labour as that in which they are engaged, on wet muddy land, with the rushes growing high above their heads. Yet they make, on that account, a very pretty little group, as they are suddenly arrested in their work by the sight of some deer, whose outstretched heads are visible beneath the distant pollards; the animals and the girls are certainly not accustomed to each other's society; there is a kind of astonished look on the part of both, each regarding the other as intruders on the marshy solitude. This etching is wonderfully full of light; that misty light one sees on a summer-morning in the neighbourhood of streams and pools, half veiling all which comes within its influence: this effect, however, is not noticeable if the print is examined closely; it should be held three or four feet from the eye to realise the truth of its light and shade in contrast, and the beautiful rendering of the distance, which then only becomes distance. This effect is produced by marvellously little labour."--The art journal, loc. cit.

[London] : [Virtue], [1874]

1 print : engraving ; image 17 x 24.8 cm

Reed gathering. Gustave Jundt. pinxt. Bracquemond sculpt.

Wellcome Collection 29550i