The Movings

1822

Louis Léopold Boilly (French, 1761–1845)

This slickly painted street scene uses the housing crisis of post-Revolutionary Paris, which forced poor people to move frequently in search of affordable homes, as a metaphor for other “movings” in life, particularly the transition from life to death. At center, a carriage loaded with furniture transports a young woman with her baby while, to their right, a black hearse moves towards the ethereal Roman church in the distance. The artist crossing the scene, easel in hand, just behind the horse may allude to the transient nature of such work, which often included travel between Rome and Paris.

Status: On View, Gallery 221
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Louis-Léopold Boilly
Title: The Movings
Place: France (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1822
Medium: Oil on canvas
Inscriptions: Inscribed lower right: L. Boilly 1822
Dimensions: 73 × 92 cm (28 3/4 × 36 1/8 in.); Framed: 94 × 113.4 cm (37 × 44 5/8 in.)
Credit Line: Harold L. Stuart Fund
Reference Number: 1982.494
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/97681/manifest.json

L’Observateur et Arlequin aux Salons, n. d. [1822], p. 19.
E.–J. Delécluze, “Beaux–Arts: Exposition Salon de 1822 (9e article),” Le Moniteur universel 2, no. 162 (June 11, 1822), p. 824.
Arthur Dinaux, “Boilly,” in Archives Historiques et Littéraires du Nord de la France et du Midi de la Belgique 6 (Valenciennes, 1847), p. 203
Henry Harrisse, L.–L. Boilly, peintre, dessinateur et lithographe: Sa vie et son oeuvre, 1761–1845 (Paris, 1898), p. 84, no. 46; also cited pp. 39, 98.
Paul Marmottan, Le Peintre Louis Boilly (1761–1845) (Paris, 1913), pp. 156–57.
Seymour de Ricci, Musée Cognacq-Jay (Paris, 1929), p. 12, under cat. 8.
E. Jonas, Collections léguées à la ville de Paris par Ernest Cognacq (Paris, 1930), p. 11, under cat. 8.
André Mabille de Poncheville, Boilly (Paris: Librarie Plon, 1931), p. 156.
André Vantoura and O. H. Gasnier, eds., Dessins français de Prud’hon à Daumier, Fribourg, 1966, n. p., cited under no. 11.
Heim Gallery, From Poussin to Puvis de Chavannes: A Loan Exhibition of French Drawings from the Collection of the Musée des Beaux Arts at Lille, exh. cat. (London, 1974), citied under no. 4.
Francis Russell, “Saleroom Discoveries,” Burlington Magazine 119, no. 887 (February 1977), p. 153 [author confuses the painting in the Musée Cognacq-Jay with the original version].
John Stephen Hallam, “The Genre Works of Louis-Leopold Boilly,” Ph. D. diss., University of Washington, 1979 (Ann Arbor: Univeristy Microfilms, 1985), p.112.
Thérèse Burollet, Musée Cognacq-Jay: Peintures et Dessins (Paris, 1980), pp. 40–42, citied under no. 9.
Marianne Delafond, Louis Boilly 1761-1845, exh. cat. (Musée Marmottan, 1984), under cat. 36.
The Burlington Magazine 126, no. 976 (July 1984), p. 463 (ill. 87).
Carol S. Eliel,” Form and Content in the Genre Works of Louis-Léopold Boilly,” Ph. D. diss., New York University, 1985 (Ann Arbor: Univeristy Microfilms, 1986), pp. 42-44, fig. 25.
Richard R. Brettell, French Salon Artists 1800–1900 (The Art Institute of Chicago, 1987), pp. 10 (ill.), 11, 13 (ill.), 117.
Annie Scottez-De Wambrechies and Sylvain Laveissière, eds., Boilly 1761/1845: Un Grand Peintre Française de la Révolution à la Restauration, exh. cat. (Musée des Beaux-Arts de Lille, 1989), pp. 128-9, under cat. 46, ill.
Susan L. Siegfried, “The Artist as Nomadic Capitalist: The Case of Louis–Léopold Boilly,” Art History 13, no. 4 (December 1990), pp. 517–26, 518 (ill.), 535.
Cara Dufour Denison, French Master Drawings: From the Pierpont Morgan Library, exh. cat. (Musée du Louvre/Pierpont Morgan Library, 1993), pp. 212, under cat. 97, ill.
Susan L. Siegfried, The Art of Louis–Léopold Boilly: Modern Life in Napoleonic France (New Haven and London, 1995), pp. 9–16, 10 (ill.),12 (det. ill.), 27, 63.
Mark Swartz, “The Movings: Louis–Leopold Boilly at the Art Institute fo Chicago: You Are What You Own,” Chicago Reader (October 4, 1996), pp. 50–51 (ill.).
Kimbell Art Museum, Calendar: Guide to Upcoming Exhibitions, Program and Services (September 1995–January 1996), pp. 13–14 (ill.).
Ewa Lajer-Burcharth, “The Exceptional Woman,” Art Bulletin 79 (December 1997), pp.
Étienne Bréton and Pascal Zuber, “ Boilly au Salon,” Boilly: 1791-1845. Exh. cat. (Palais des Beaux Arts de Lille, 2011), p. 63. p. 67, p. 216, cat. 144.
Sam Ramos and Kristen French, “More Crucial than Ever: Civic Wellness at the Art Institute of Chicago,” Journal of Museum Education (Jan. 2025): 5 fig. 3.

Paris, Salon, Explication des ouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture et gravure, des artistes vivans, exposés au Musée Royal des Arts, 1822, cat. 121.
New York, Wildenstein Gallery, Consulat–Empire–Restauration: Art In Early XIX Century France, April 21–May 28, 1982, pp. 74–75 (ill.), 87–88.
Ft. Worth, Texas, Kimbell Art Museum, The Art of Louis-Leopold Boilly: Modern Life in Napoleonic France, November 4, 1995–January 12, 1996; Washington DC, National Gallery of Art, February 4–April 28, 1996.
Minneapolis, Institute of Art, Crossing the Channel: British and French Painting in the Age of Romanticism, June 8–September 7, 2003, cat. 87; traveled to New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 7, 2003–January 4, 2004.
Lille, France, Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, Louis-Léopold Boilly, November 4, 2011- February 6, 2012. cat. 144.

In the possession of Louis-Léopold Boilly; his sale, Paris, April 13–14, 1829, lot 4; sold to James-Alexandre, comte de Pourtalès-Gorgier (died 1855), Paris [Harrisse 1898]; Comte de Pourtalès-Gorgier Sale, Paris, March 21–April 4, 1865, lot 225; sold to Sauvage [see Hippolyte Mireur, Dictionnaire des ventes d’art faites en France et à l’étranger pendant les XVIIIme et XIXme siècles, Paris, 1911-1912]. Comtesse de Gramont d’Aster (1855–1905), Paris by 1898 [according to Harrisse 1898]. Pierre Thomas, comte de Pange (1875–1946), Paris. Private collection in U.S.A. [New York 1982]; Wildenstein and Co., New York, by 1982; sold to the Art Institute, 1982.

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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