Woman Reading in a Landscape
Although the majority of what Corot produced was landscapes, he did produce a number of portraits as well. This painting is a bit of both, as it depicts a man in a boat in the background of a woman reading. In his later years, Corot created many such paintings of solitary women reading, yet this was the only one that he exhibited during his lifetime. Perhaps his obsession with solitary women had something to do with the fact that he remained without a wife his entire life. Early on in his painting career, he wrote that he was devoted to a lifetime of painting, and therefore did not have time for marriage.
