Under the shelter of her far-sighted affection, the artist closed his ears to hostile comments, and followed his bent, without trying to modify his manner of seeing and feeling nature. None the less, the paintings of this period are far from perfect; a certain constraint is apparent in them, due to inexperience and also to some lingering influence either of his studio training or of Italy. The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, The Village Firemen, Meditation, Herodiade, Julie, Saint Camilla at the bedside of a dying man, while they reveal some very genuine personal qualities, are none the less somewhat reminiscent of the manner of Couture, by whom he seems to have been most directly influenced.
His first real picture, the one which first marked and fixed for all time the artist's personality, was Peace, now in the Museum at Amiens. So much knowledge and so much harmony were displayed in this picture that the jury simply did not dare reject it. What is more, it won for its author a medal of the second class. He was not slow in giving it a companion piece, in the shape of a painting entitled War, which is now also at Amiens.
In the first of these pictures, the one consecrated to the pleasures of Peace, everything seems quite academic, the poses, the composition, the countenances: and yet, there is no stiffness, everything is vibrant, alive, palpitating in a serene and luminous atmosphere. The artist has herein magnificently demonstrated the truth of a phrase which he wrote to Ary Renan, in the course of a trip which the latter took to Italy: "Just as you yourself feel and have very well expressed, no study of other artists' work can trammel one's originality." Neither the memory of Italy nor the influence of Couture had prevented him from asserting himself, and that, too, vigorously.
War is, if anything, superior to Peace. The painter is here wholly himself. There is no longer in his work any trace of outside influence. And what vigour there is, what eloquence, in the simplicity of the composition! Is there in existence a more admirable argument against war and its horrors? Beside the corpse of a young warrior, a father and mother are prostrated, voicing aloud their anguish; and meanwhile the conquerors, approaching from the far horizon black with devastation and slaughter, blow their victorious trumpets and urge their horses forward towards the group of mourners.
From that moment, Puvis de Chavannes began to command attention. He was discussed more acrimoniously, more passionately than ever; no one could neglect him nor pretend not to have heard of him.
The government bought Peace, but refused to purchase War, in spite of the fact that the two paintings were companion pieces. In order to prevent them from being separated, the artist generously donated the second picture.
In 1863 came a new series representing Labour and Rest. Faithful to his principles, the author gathers together on his canvas the entire cycle of actions and ideas suggested by his subject.
In Labour he has placed in the foreground a group of blacksmiths, representing, in his eyes, the fully developed type of the worker, because of the degree of their exertion, the vigour of their action. While two of them stir the fire, the others, armed with heavy sledges, strike alternate blows upon the anvil. At no great distance, some carpenters are squaring the trunks of trees; beyond, on the plain, a peasant can be seen, guiding his ploughshare through its furrow. In the foreground there is also a woman, nursing a young child. The entire cycle of human toil is glorified in this single painting.
Repose shows us an old man seated, giving to the young folk grouped around him wise counsel, drawn from his long experience. Nothing could be more graceful than the relaxed postures of the different figures, who, we feel, are listening with real attention.
Since these four pictures, Peace, War, Labour, Repose, were the interpretation of general ideas, the artist could not give them any precise setting, any local colour. The nude, which is employed for all the figures, was his sole means of obtaining absolute truth.