Cleveland Museum of Art

Women Meeting in the Shade

Ker Xavier Roussel

Date

c. 1890

Medium

oil on canvas

Culture

France, 19th century

Department

Modern European Painting and Sculpture

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Roussel was a founding member of the French avant-garde group known as the Nabis (prophets) and the brother-in-law of fellow member Édouard Vuillard. Roussel shared their fascination with Japanese prints and developed a style of radically simplified forms and strong, decorative color. His intimate views of daily life convey a mood of quiet feeling rather than focusing on narrative, storytelling content. This painting depicts a group of figures, presumably two women and four children, meeting in the shade of tall trees, while other figures walk along the grassy riverbank. Known mostly for his small Nabis paintings of the 1890s, Roussel also produced large murals for the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, and the Palais des Nations in Geneva.

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