Stringing Onions 1882

John Singer Sargent made this oil painting, "Stringing Onions," sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century. It shows two working-class women, one standing and stringing onions, the other sitting and peeling. Sargent was an American artist who spent much of his career in Europe, and he's best known for his portraits of wealthy patrons. However, he also painted scenes of everyday life, like this one. "Stringing Onions" offers a glimpse into the lives of working-class women in Europe at the time. We can see the modest surroundings in which they lived and worked, and the painting suggests the hard labor required to make a living. To understand this work more fully, we could consult census records, photographs, and other documents that shed light on the lives of working-class people in Europe. It helps us understand the social conditions that shaped Sargent's artistic production and the power of art to reveal existing social norms.