The painting is a study for “Julegæssene plukkes” (The Christmas geese are plucked), dated 1904 (The National Gallery of Denmark, Inv. No. KMS1845). The young Skagen woman with the red blouse in the present painting is seen on the right.

Plucking poultry is a motif Anna Ancher has used several times, the first time was with “To gamle, der plukker måger” (An old couple plucking gulls) from 1882 (The Hirschsprung Collection). In the middle of the 1880s, Anna painted “Gamle Lene plukker en gås” (Old Lene plucking a goose) (Art Museums of Skagen Inv. No. 775). Serious and concentrated, Lene does her work just like the old couple. Around 1900, Anna painted “Young girl plucking a swan”. See cat. no. 162. Again in 1904 the motif is coming up, this time with a group of people from Skagen plucking Christmas geese.

Anna Ancher must have known Max Liebermann's “Women plucking geese”, 1871/72 at the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. There are strong points of similarity between Max Liebermann's goose picker placed on the right side and the young Skagen woman also on the right side of Anna Ancher’s painting (for this interesting point see: Heide Grape-Albers, “Die Malerei Anna Anchers Einbliche in das Alltägliche” p. 58 in “Malerin Anna Ancher in Skagen”, exhibition catalogue, 1994).

Provenance: Lawyer Otto Bing. Bruun Rasmussen auction 203, 1967 no. 1, ill. p. 7.