The artwork titled “Peasant Woman, Stooping with a Spade, Digging Up Carrots” is a sketch created by the renowned artist Vincent van Gogh in 1885 in Nuenen, Netherlands. Executed with chalk on paper, this piece exemplifies the Realism movement and serves as a study of ordinary life. It is currently housed in the National Museum of Contemporary Art (MNAC) in Bucharest, Romania.
The artwork portrays a peasant woman bent over in a laborious posture, engaged in the task of digging up carrots with a spade. The figure is characterized by her heavy, draped clothing which blends into the background, emphasizing the physical exertion and toil commonly associated with agricultural labor. The strokes are deliberate and dense, capturing the textures of the woman’s clothing and the earth she works on, enhancing the starkness and simplicity of the rural life Van Gogh sought to depict. The choice of medium, chalk on paper, lends a rawness and immediacy to the rendering, further immersing the viewer in the daily struggles and perseverance of the working class during that period.
