Artwork
The Fruit Seller
The Fruit Seller is an oil painting by the Early Baroque Italian artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo. It dates from 1655 and is held in the collection of the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts.
About this work
Overview
Created in 1655 by the Spanish Baroque artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, this oil painting presents a solitary figure engaged in a modest domestic activity. The work resides in the State Hermitage Museum, where it exemplifies Murillo’s early forays into genre scenes that document everyday life in seventeenth‑century Spain.
Subject & Meaning
The composition centers on a young woman dressed in a dark gown and white headscarf, her hands clasping a basket filled with potatoes, onions and a bundle resembling cotton. She adjusts a white cloth while a glimpse of a red skirt emerges from beneath her apron, suggesting a moment of quiet labor in a market or household setting.
Technique & Style
Murillo employs a restrained chiaroscuro, allowing a soft light to illuminate the figure’s face and hands against a muted, cloud‑filled backdrop. Delicate brushwork renders the texture of the fabrics and the varied surfaces of the fruit, while the overall palette of muted earth tones reflects the early Baroque sensibility toward realism and subtle emotional tone.
History & Provenance
After its completion, the painting entered private collections before being acquired by the State Hermitage Museum, where it has been on display since the early twentieth century. Its presence in the museum’s holdings underscores Murillo’s reputation not only for religious commissions but also for his genre works that capture the social fabric of his era.
Artist & collection
Artist
Bartolomé Esteban Murillo ( mure-IL-oh, m(y)uu-REE-oh, Spanish: ; late December 1617, baptised 1 January 1618 – 3 April 1682) was a Spanish Baroque painter.
