Asking the impossible - Jean-François Millet

My search skills are sadly lacking.  Perhaps someone could help me find the impossible?

I want to learn more about Jean-François Millet,  and would love to find a book about his work.  A book with all his art in it would be best, with some text as well, but mostly pictures.  Or failing that, something that focuses on his agricultural paintings and drawings.   It turns out I do best with books for this sort of thing, although there are some great online resources for millet that I've been devouring.   I find my brain is better matched to see art in books or non-backlit mediums.  

Normally, I would go to the library and borrow all the books on an artist, then find the best one, save up for a few months to buy it.  Art books are woefully expencive and it's a risk to buy one on speculation as my income is not art book friendly.   I've also kept an eye out at thrift stores and yard sales and found some great art books there.

But for some reason, this Millet guy is shunned in local circles.  Like a guy with extreme flatulence in an elevator, no one has anything about him.  I even looked in new and used bookstores in town and found nothing millet related.

The ideal goal would be something like this book about van gogh.  Although the book is small, I can see his works in the book without the distraction or distortion from the backlight of a digital gadget.

Ideally, it would be from Amazon Canada because free shipping and gift cards.  For every $20cad, that's about a month to save up.  So less price is better.  But even an expencive book I can put on my wishlist for Christmas would be lovely.

Any ideas for a good book on millet?

To learn more about Millet

https://youtu.be/Bh_OWS3k6tU?si=iwo3XtOHrCCSzn4i
(Sorry, owner of video prevents embedding)

Although there is no explanation why he is so unpopular now.  

On amazon.ca,  I've found two books.  One is a kids book and has about 50 pages. The other seems to be mostly text about the influence millet had on others.  This one is 200 pages, but says nothing about lots of pictures.

Here's a few for you to try and track down....

Drawn_into_the_Light by Alexandra R. Murphy

This one sounds like a great one if you can get hold of it: Book review of Jean Francois Millet by Estelle M. Hurll

Millet and Modern Art From Van Gogh to Dalí edited by Simon Kelly and Maite van Dijk appears more to be a discussion of his influence.

No idea about this one: The Art And Etchings Of Jean-françois Millet by Robert J Wickenden

Thank you.  Wonderful list!

Amazon has some of those so I'll put them on the wishlist.  

I've been wondering if there might be a french language book out there with lots of pictures, but google and amazon only give me English language results.  

Putting this here for me for later.  The words "Barbizon School" seem to be related to millet somehow.  Maybe there is a picture book on that?

First of all, yandex is your search engine that is not censored by g00gl3
You might want to add it to your tabs or bookmarks, in these days of information warfare.

Here is one of the paintings:  https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1972.19-return-from-the-fiel

Here is a book for free (might even be the one you're looking for! haha):  https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13119

And a book in French for sale:  https://www.amazon.com/Jean-Francois-Millet-Pastels-Drawings-French/dp/2914661401

You'll have to see if those are the right person...

That middle book on gutenberg shows promise.  If it's old enough and I can get a good quality PDF, I can have it printed at the local print shop.  I'll keep looking.  

Thanks for finding these.

Nancy Reading wrote:Here's a few for you to try and track down....

Millet and Modern Art From Van Gogh to Dalí edited by Simon Kelly and Maite van Dijk appears more to be a discussion of his influence.

Interesting book.  Very 21st century views on millet, but mostly focused on the future artists.  Definitely increasing my love of hismwork.  

Although the textile images are sometimes mislabeled.  She is quite clearly hackling flax as per the bundles on the floor and broken straw near the window.  Probably a mistranslation from the french, I'm sure.  But it does give interesting insight into flax processing at that time.

I didn't know the connection between millet and van gogh's weaver series before.  Lots to learn there.

In central Wisconsin, it's pretty hard to find a book, any book, dealing with art. So a book about my compatriot and artist is unobtainable.
You can browse the full collections and archives of his paintings through the Art Renewal Center or the National Gallery of Art.
https://www.artrenewal.org/artists/jean-francois-millet/745
https://www.nga.gov/artists/1720-jean-francois-millet
Not as good as a book you could hold, I know, but still a pretty good rendition

R Ransom....you might want to try Abebooks.com.   I buy most of my books from them, as they're probably the biggest online seller of used books.  Many of the books I bought from them were actually NEW at used prices.  I checked that site for you...they have some of Millet's books.

our local library network has an online catalog search and several of his works are available, (some are reference books  and thus only viewed at the library others are check out or eBooks).  try a site like https://library.pugetsound.edu/home and see what's available local to you.

J. Syme wrote:our local library network has an online catalog search and several of his works are available, (some are reference books  and thus only viewed at the library others are check out or eBooks).  try a site like https://library.pugetsound.edu/home and see what's available local to you.

Were there any books that appealed to you more than others?

It looks like it's on our interlibrary loan system, but I'm limited to only one more ILL this year.

r ransom wrote:

J. Syme wrote:our local library network has an online catalog search and several of his works are available, (some are reference books  and thus only viewed at the library others are check out or eBooks).  try a site like https://library.pugetsound.edu/home and see what's available local to you.

Were there any books that appealed to you more than others?

It looks like it's on our interlibrary loan system, but I'm limited to only one more ILL this year.

see it they have this one:        Jean-François Millet, Peasant and Painter           by Alfred Sensier   (bio)
or  illustrations one:     Jean-Francois Millet: Drawn Into the Light by Alexandra R. Murphy