51�Թ�

And they’re very different from the ennobled peasants in popular genre paintings by artists like the Le Nain brothers in France or cheery laborers by Dutch artist Johannes Lingelbach.

Artworks from the 20th and 21st centuries could be placed next to old master paintings from the cathedral’s collection, such as Mathieu Le Nain’s “Nativity of the Virgin Mary,” Chauvet said.

One of the least-known sources of modern realism will be honored Sunday, May 22, in Fort Worth, where the Kimbell Art Museum is opening “The Brothers Le Nain: Painters of Seventeenth-Century France.”

Collective anonymity has always seemed appropriate to the way the Le Nain brought painting down to earth, but this rare overview of 44 paintings — including less radical religious works — also presents new scholarship regarding which brother did what.

Often signing their efforts simply Le Nain, they elevated genre painting with dignified depictions of peasants usually seated, motionless, in landscapes or plain interiors.