Artist: Gustave Caillebotte

Year: 1875

Medium: Oil on canvas

Les raboteurs de parquet (English title: The Floor Scrapers) is an oil painting by French Impressionist Gustave Caillebotte. The canvas measures 102 by 146.5 centimetres (40.2 in × 57.7 in). It was originally given by Caillebotte's family in 1894 to the Musée du Luxembourg, then transferred to the Musée du Louvre in 1929. In 1947, it was moved to the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume, and in 1986, it was transferred again to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, where it is currently displayed.

(...) Despite the effort Caillebotte put into the painting, it was rejected by France's most prestigious art exhibition, the Salon, for the Salon of 1875. The depiction of working-class people in their trade, not fully clothed, shocked the jurors and was deemed a "vulgar subject matter". He was hurt by this rejection, and instead showed it at the second exhibition of the Impressionists, with whom he had already associated himself, in 1876. He presented it alongside some of his other works, including a second, different version of Raboteurs from 1876, and his earlier work Jeune homme à sa fenêtre (Young Man at His Window). The images of the floor scrapers came to be associated with Degas's paintings of washerwomen, also presented at the same exhibition and similarly scorned as "vulgar".

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That open bottle of wine is entirely understandable.

I love this. It is a candid look into an everyday working people's life.
It is human - all the way.

Yes, I think so too.

Although Caillebotte himself came from a wealthy family - and the painting is often believed to depict his studio - he was among the notable artists of his generation to portray the everyday lives of urban workers. His subject matter challenged the class biases and social hierarchies that still shaped much of the art world at the time.

In the 18-early 20th century, there was a fundamental conflict between academic art, where art was seen as a tool to make the masses more moral (better conform to the ideals of the ruling class; you could have nudity and sexuality in the academie, but only if explicitly about scary foreign cultures), and modern realism, where the art was describing the world as the artists saw it.

I have a drink when I’m working in my garage. Seems like a reasonable thing to do.

Why are they scraping the floor? Was this just part of the process of installing a wood floor back in the day? Is this what they did instead of waxing them? Lovely painting, but I’m super curious about what exactly they’re doing and why.

They scraped off the old oil and dirt and then renewed the oil.

I don't remember the dates of it any more - but I do recall a "peasant revival" or something like that in german - Central Eu art.
When the artists actually went all out to show the back to nature - living with nature parts.
Not surprising that the working class is actually missing from these pictures.

All of that peeled off is dirty oil?! Eww.

Actual living with nature or romantic?

Romantic but some of it was in realistic sense and also roman revival.
Better search terms for it would be Volk, Volkskunst & Bauernkunst.
Here are some I was thinking about:
Id. Marko Karoly, Szinyei Merse Pal, and mostly Munkácsy Mihály.

These days they sand it, and then you're breathing wood and wax varnish dust.

Smells so nice though, too bad it's cancerous

No, it's also wood. Those types of scrapers will also shave a paper thin layer of wood along with the junk.

It's difficult to render the brightness of the light in the original oil painting. This whole piece glows in real life.

Sandpaper didn't exist back in the day, they used metal sheets and created a burl that they'd use to scrape the wood to make it smooth and/or remove layers.

I can imagine the situation:

Workers: Er… OK. You can paint us sure. As long as we get paid for the job at the end

Gustave: Yes, yes of course. Carry on.

Workers:

Gustave: Take off your shirts.

Workers: What?

Gustave: You heard me.

Many of his do. Incredible artist.