The Capri grape picker

In 19th-century painting, works inspired by beautiful Italian peasant women constitute almost a genre in themselves, highly prized by collectors.
One of the artists working in this European pictorial vein was Rudolf Lehmann (1819–1905). A former student of Ingres at the Villa Medici, he liked to portray young women of ordinary means under the clear Mediterranean sky, wearing white headdresses and traditional costumes depicted with finesse and precision. This new ideal of beauty referred to modern Italy and no longer just to Antiquity.
This engraving is from one of his most famous paintings: The Grape Picker of Capri.