# Broken Eggs

**Jean Baptiste Greuze** (French, 1725–1805)  
1756  
Oil on canvas  
28 3/4 x 37 in. (73 x 94 cm)

Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 20.155.8. [The museum's record](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436579).

## About this work

A young woman sits dejected beside a basket of broken eggs, while an older woman remonstrates with a young man who seems eager to slip away. The broken eggs are a pointed metaphor for lost innocence. Greuze painted the scene in Rome in 1756 and showed it at the Paris Salon the following year, where his moralising pictures of everyday life found an enthusiastic public. The careful finish and theatrical gestures reflect his ambition to give domestic subjects the seriousness of history painting.

_Written by Ochre Editions._

Jean Baptiste Greuze painted this in 1756, aged 31. It is now at The Met in New York.

### How it was made

- **Oil paint.** Pigment ground in a drying oil, usually linseed. It dries slowly, so painters could blend on the canvas, build up thin translucent glazes, and rework a picture over weeks. Canvas replaced wooden panels in the 1500s because it is lighter and can be rolled.

### [Jean Baptiste Greuze](https://www.ochreeditions.com/artists/jean-baptiste-greuze)

French, 1725–1805; born in Tournus; died in Paris

Greuze rose to fame at the Paris Salon in the later 1750s with moralising scenes of family life, sentimental and theatrical, which the critic Denis Diderot championed. Broken Eggs, shown at the Salon of 1757, tells a story of lost innocence through a single domestic incident. When the Academy received him in 1769 as a genre painter rather than a history painter, he withdrew from the Salon for many years.

_Written by Ochre Editions._

## Facts

- Type: Paintings
- The artist was 31
- Real size: about 29 × 37 in (73 × 94 cm). The original is larger than our largest print, 20 × 30 in, so every print is a reduction.
- Century: 18th century
- Subjects: Interiors, Children, Men, Women, Eggs
- Colour: brown
- Rights: public domain (CC0 1.0); free to use for any purpose.

## Get it

- Free download, full resolution: https://img.ochreeditions.com/m/1099.jpg?dl=1
- Image: https://img.ochreeditions.com/a/1099/1920.jpg
- Giclée reproduction on Hahnemühle Photo Rag: 8 × 10 in $28; 11 × 14 in $38; 12 × 16 in $42; 16 × 20 in $56; 18 × 24 in $68; 20 × 30 in $86
- Framed reproduction: 8 × 10 in $78; 11 × 14 in $98; 12 × 16 in $108; 16 × 20 in $138; 18 × 24 in $164; 20 × 30 in $208
- Canvas reproduction: 8 × 10 in $58; 11 × 14 in $72; 12 × 16 in $79; 16 × 20 in $98; 18 × 24 in $118; 20 × 30 in $148
- Print-ready file: 8 × 10 in $2; 11 × 14 in $2; 12 × 16 in $3; 16 × 20 in $3; 18 × 24 in $3; 20 × 30 in $5

Sizes stop where the museum's file would print below 150 pixels per inch. Everything sold is a reproduction, made to order. [Order a print](https://www.ochreeditions.com/art/broken-eggs-met-436579).