Originally titled Les Glaneuses (1857). It translates to The Gleaners depicting women stooping in the fields to glean the leftovers from the harvest, and is a monumental composition devoted to the rigors of the working class. Picking up what was left of the harvest was regarded as one of the lowest jobs in society. However, Millet offered these women as the heroic focus of the picture; previously, servants were depicted in paintings as subservient to a noble or king. Here, light illuminates the women's shoulders as they carry out their work. Behind them, the field that stretches into the distance is bathed in golden light, under a wide, magnificent sky. The forms of the three figures themselves, nearly silhouetted against the lighter field, show balance and harmony. The other painting is The Angelus (1857-59), originally entitled Prayer for the Potato Crop. The Angelus was reproduced frequently in the 19th and 20th centuries. Salvador Dali was fascinated by this work, and wrote an analysis of it, The Tragic Myth of The Angelus of Millet. Rather than seeing it as a work of spiritual peace, Dali believed it held messages of repressed sexual aggression. Dali was also of the opinion that the two figures were praying over their buried child, rather than to the Angelus. Dali was so insistent on this fact that eventually an x-ray was done of the canvas, confirming his suspicions: the painting contains a painted-over geometric shape strikingly similar to a coffin. However, it is unclear whether Millet changed his mind on the meaning of the painting, or even if the shape actually is a coffin. (From Wikipedia) Jean-Francois Millet (1814-75) was the son of a small peasant farmer of Gréville in Normandy, Millet showed a precocious interest in drawing and arrived in Paris in 1838 to become a pupil of Paul Delaroche.