The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of July 9, 2026

A vertically oriented grainy lithograph on gray paper depicts a woman with a light skin tone seated and facing right. She leans forward, head bowed as she peels potatoes in her lap. Strong light from a window to our right illuminates her torso and textured skirt, while the background remains in heavy shadow. She wears a dark garment, her hair pulled into a bun. Dense, hazy strokes create an atmospheric composition.

The Potato Peeler

1893

Ker Xavier Roussel

(French, 1867–1944)
printer

Edward Ancourt

(French, 1841–1898?)
France
lithograph on gray laid paper
Image: 19.1 x 15.6 cm (7 1/2 x 6 1/8 in.)
Dudley P. Allen Fund 2024.57
Catalogue raisonné: Salomon 2
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

This print is the first of several in which Ker-Xavier Roussel collaborated with renowned master printmaker Edward Ancourt.

Description

This print presents the type of domestic scene that Ker-Xavier Roussel and his Nabi colleagues favored during the 1890s. Artists in this circle used simplified forms and bold color to depict subject matter drawn from contemporary Paris, both domestic and public. Created in the year that Roussel married Marie, the sister of his close friend Édouard Vuillard, this lithograph may be a portrait of his new wife. The figure appears fully absorbed in her task, but also completely isolated from the outside world in starkly contrasting light and dark tones.
  • 2019
    (sale, Swann Galleries, New York, September 19, 2019, no. 93, sold to Eric Gillis Fine Art)
    2019
    (Eric Gillis Fine Art, Brussels, sold to private collection)
    2019–24
    Private Collection, New York, NY
    2024
    (Mireille Mosler, New York, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)
    September 9, 2024–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • {{cite web|title=The Potato Peeler|url=false|author=Ker Xavier Roussel, Edward Ancourt|year=1893|access-date=09 July 2026|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2024.57