The Brittany pardons (pilgrimages), held in small villages throughout this region of France, are yearly religious festivals at which remission of punishment due for sins is granted. Shown departing from a church in procession, the local inhabitants wear the traditional costumes reserved for the event. The almost photographic realism with which the artist has recorded this scene earned him great praise when the work was shown in the Salon of 1887 and at the Paris Exposition Universelle of 1889.

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