Philadelphia native Daniel Ridgway Knight began his artistic training at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. In 1861, he traveled to Paris, continuing his education in the studio of Charles Gleyre, whose other students included James McNeill Whistler, Claude Monet, and Auguste Renoir. He also was accepted to Paris’ prestigious École des Beaux-Arts, where he trained under the successful Salon painter Alexandre Cabanel.
During his time in France, Ridgway Knight came to know most of the latest trends in contemporary art. He met the future Impressionists at Gleyre’s studio, encountered Jean-François Millet, the great painter of French peasantry, in the village of Barbizon, and became a close friend of the enormously popular artist Ernest Meissonier—he would absorb influences from all these sources. His images of lovely rural women, including Peasant in a Field, were thematically aligned with Millet’s. But he also learned from the Impressionists, as is evident in the sketchy quality of the landscapes from which his deftly modeled figures emerge.
DANIEL RIDGWAY KNIGHT, American, 1839 – 1924
Peasant in a Field, ca. 1880
Oil on canvas
Gift of Susan Adler Thorp in memory of Herta and Dr. Justin H. Adler, 2026.1