George Sand's Garden at Nohant

In the pictureDark green trees fill the canvas, and at the end of a small path running between them sits a stone bench. Only at the upper left does the sky open up a little; the rest is layer upon layer of leaves and shade. There are no figures, and the brushwork captures light and shadow in masses rather than leaf by leaf.

BackgroundNohant was the country house of the novelist George Sand, and Delacroix stayed there in the summers of 1842 and 1843 at the invitation of Sand and Chopin. It was rare for a painter known for history paintings and dramatic scenes to paint such a quiet garden, so the work reads as a record of a summer spent at a friend's home. The canvas is also small, closer to a study painted directly from observation outdoors.

Puzzle tipWith almost nothing but green pieces, this is a hard puzzle. First fix the sky pieces at the upper left, the brown pieces of the tree trunk on the right, and the light pieces of the bench in the middle; then sort the remaining greens into two piles, bright yellow-green and dark blue-green, and assemble them with the preview on. We recommend 100 pieces or fewer.