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National Gallery of Art

  • Visit

    • Plan Your Visit
    • Accessibility
    • Visiting with Kids
    • Food and Drink
    • Tours and Guides
    • Explore the Campus

    Open today 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.
    Admission is always free

    6th and Constitution Ave NW 
    Washington, DC 20565

    Sculpture Garden Extended Hours

    Open late until 8:00 p.m. on select nights

    Through September 5

  • Exhibitions & Events

    • Exhibitions
    • Calendar
    • Kid-Friendly Events

    America’s 250th

    Celebrating American art and artists

  • Art & Artists

    • Artworks
    • Artists
    • Stories
    • Fun and Games
    • Educational Resources
    • Research

    Open Call

    Artists Reimagining the Collection

    Meet the 50 makers selected from more than 1,600 submissions

Utility

  • Support
  • Shop
  • Become a Member

  • Visit

    • Plan Your Visit
    • Accessibility
    • Visiting with Kids
    • Food and Drink
    • Tours and Guides
    • Explore the Campus

    Open today 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.
    Admission is always free

    6th and Constitution Ave NW 
    Washington, DC 20565

    Sculpture Garden Extended Hours

    Open late until 8:00 p.m. on select nights

    Through September 5

  • Exhibitions & Events

    • Exhibitions
    • Calendar
    • Kid-Friendly Events

    America’s 250th

    Celebrating American art and artists

  • Art & Artists

    • Artworks
    • Artists
    • Stories
    • Fun and Games
    • Educational Resources
    • Research

    Open Call

    Artists Reimagining the Collection

    Meet the 50 makers selected from more than 1,600 submissions

Utility

  • Support
  • Shop
  • Become a Member

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  • Open 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.
  • See extended hours

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    active 1960

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    Three young boys, four girls, and a dark brown dog gather in a loose semi-circle in a grassy clearing near a grove of trees in this horizontal landscape painting. The children all have pale skin with flushed cheeks, brown hair, and dark eyes. The girls wear corseted dresses with long skirts and cap-like bonnets, and the boys wear jackets with tails, knee-length pants, stockings, and black shoes with buckles. The three boys look at us while the four girls look around the scene. A long plank of wood has been laid across a thick, sawed tree trunk to make a seesaw. One boy, wearing fawn brown, sits on one end near the ground, to our left. The oldest girl braces the youngest on the opposite end of the plank, which is lifted into the air. The oldest girl wears a sheer, white apron over a coral-pink dress. Like the other two girls, the youngest child wears a white dress but hers has a pink sash and pink ribbons are tied into her and the oldest girl’s white caps. A boy wearing a moss-green suit looks at us and raises his dark cap in one hand as he stands balanced with his feet widely planted at the center of the angled plank of wood. To our right and closer to us, one of the younger girls, wearing a topaz-blue sash with a blue ribbon in her cap, stands in front of the oldest boy, who holds a tall staff that reaches off the top edge of the painting in the crook of one elbow. This boy holds a small silver fish in both hands. The girl touches one of his hands with her own, and looks up at the fish. The fourth girl and the dog sit on the ground at the front center of the painting. The dog rests its front legs across her lap and she looks off to our right. A pool of water reflects light in the lower right corner of the painting, and a deeply shadowed, verdant forest frames the rightmost third of the composition. Upon closer inspection, we find an open basket and red cloth near the water, almost lost in shadow near the lower right corner of the painting. Beyond the group of children, a tree-filled valley leads back to another body of water and hills in the deep distance to our left, and a few pale gray clouds float across a blue sky.
    Johann Zoffany, The Lavie Children, c. 1770, oil on canvas, Paul Mellon Collection, 1983.1.48

    The Lavie Children

    The Lavie Children

    Johann Zoffany · c. 1770 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1983.1.48

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