Provenance
(Anthony Speelman, London);[1] Robert H. Smith, Washington, D.C., by 1988; (sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, 14 January 1988, no. 86, bought in); Mr. and Mrs. Robert H. Smith, Washington, D.C.; gift 1989 to NGA.
[1] In a letter of 7 September 1993 (in NGA curatorial files), Anthony Speelman wrote to Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr.: "The only provenance that I have on the Savery is that it was bought in c. 1890 in Berne by the previous owner's family..."
Accession Number
1989.22.1
Medium
oil on panel
Dimensions
overall: 54.3 x 91.5 cm (21 3/8 x 36 in.) | framed: 71.1 x 107.6 x 5.7 cm (28 x 42 3/8 x 2 1/4 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Gift of Robert H. and Clarice Smith, in Honor of the 50th Anniversary of the National Gallery of Art
Tags
Painting Baroque (1600–1750) Oil Painting Panel Painting Dutch
Background & Context
Background Story
The Burden (Laundress), painted around 1850-1853, depicts a laundress and her child descending a steep Parisian stairway, the woman bent under the weight of her laundry basket. It captures working-class exhaustion and dignity with directness that distinguishes Daumier from academic idealization and genre sentimentality.
Daumier was the greatest political caricaturist of the 19th century, but his paintings represent an equally important contribution to Realism. The Laundress is his most celebrated painting, its power deriving from the same genius for reducing the human figure to its essential gesture.
The woman's bent posture, mirrored by the child's downward glance, creates extraordinary economy. The stairway receding steeply upward emphasizes the weight they carry and the distance they must travel. Daumier painted the laundress with sympathy that never condescends: her burden is real, not symbolic.
Cultural Impact
Daumier's paintings established the working-class subject as worthy of serious artistic treatment and influenced Social Realism from Courbet to the Ashcan School. His combination of caricaturist's eye and painter's hand created a new kind of realism.
Why It Matters
The Burden is Daumier's testament to the working poor: a painting finding in a laundress descending a stairway the same gravity, formal beauty, and claim on attention that academic art reserved for gods and heroes.
