Fields with trees in Barbizon

Fields with Trees in Barbizon (1883) shows Seurat working in the forest landscape most closely associated with his predecessors: Barbizon, where Millet, Corot, Rousseau, and Diaz had spent their careers observing the forest of Fontainebleau. By returning to this canonical site Seurat measured his own developing method against the Barbizon tradition. The openness of a cultivated field at its edge allowed him to explore tonal gradation and atmospheric depth within an established genre of French landscape painting.

The landscape is handled in varied directional strokes that differentiate the textures of cultivated ground, distant treeline, and sky. The tonal organisation follows Barbizon precedent while introducing a greater uniformity of mark-making that signals Seurat's move towards systematic method.