Having begun to adapt the motif of the road to the local urban setting in 1871, in 1873-1874 Giuseppe De Nittis (February 25, 1846 - August 21, 1884) painted many views of Paris.
In these he captured the spectacle of a modern city, often indulging in images of elegant women walking or riding or promenading children and dogs.
Adopting a Naturalistic approach, he used complex and bold compositional structures, as in How Cold it Is! (1874; Milan, Eredi Jucker priv. col., see 1990 exh. cat., p. 101).
The vivid sense of movement created by the figures in this work reflects De Nittis’s habit of sketching and painting them in motion; here they are modelled, as usual, by his wife, Leontine Gruvelle.