The Gleaners [SEP] creator
The Gleaners
The Gleaners ("Des glaneuses") is an oil painting by Jean-François Millet completed in 1857.
It depicts three peasant women gleaning a field of stray stalks of wheat after the harvest. The painting is famous for featuring in a sympathetic way what were then the lowest ranks of rural society; this was received poorly by the French upper classes.
History.
Millet's "The Gleaners" was preceded by a vertical painting of the image in 1854 and an etching in 1855. Millet
the age of sixteen who believe in a "Supreme Being, the Creator and Preserver of the Universe". Members were voted on by blackball ballot, with two blackballs sufficient for rejection. There were three categories of membership - Junior, Beneficiary and Cooperative. Cooperative members joined the organization, but without insurance benefits. Juniors were insured from birth to age fifteen and became Beneficiary members after they turned twenty one.
In 1969 the Gleaners had 55,000 members. By 1979 this had declined to 47,000 members. The Gleaners had 43,000