Detail of Italian Couple at a Roadside Shrine by Robert in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, May 2010

Artist: Louis-Léopold Robert (Swiss, 1794–1835)

Title: Italian Couple at a Roadside Shrine

Date: 1824

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 14 3/8 x 17 5/8 in. (36.5 x 44.8 cm)

Classification: Paintings

Credit Line: The Whitney Collection, Promised Gift of Wheelock Whitney III, and Purchase, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Charles S. McVeigh, by exchange, 2003

Accession Number: 2003.42.50


Gallery Label:

The brigands who inhabited the mountains outside of Rome were known both for their criminal ways and their profound religious devotion. Here, a young couple prays at a roadside shrine, presumably for the health of the wife who is noticeably pregnant. Robert was one of a number of artists working in Rome, including Achille-Etna Michallon, François-Joseph Navez, and Jean-Victor Schnetz, who popularized such scenes in the 1820s.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/collection_database/europe...