Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Wednesday, 16 April 1884

I go to Sèvres every day. This painting has me in its grip! The apple tree is in bloom, all around the pale green leaves are pushing out and the sun plays on this beautiful spring foliage. [Crossed out: at the foot of the tree] in the grass, violets, yellow flowers bursting like little suns. The air is perfumed.
And the girl dreaming at the foot of the tree, "languid and intoxicated" as A. Theuriet says. If one could truly render that effect of sap, of spring, of sun — it would be beautiful.
Thursday, 17 April 1884

Notes

The Sèvres canvas became Le Printemps — Marie herself proposed calling it Avril — a peasant girl dreaming under a flowering apple tree, about 215 × 200 cm. It is attributed to the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg, though the museum does not publish it and the attribution is not documented. ↩