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In 1874 Munkácsy visited the town of his childhood in Hungary, Békéscsaba. The two versions (executed in 1874 and 1883) of the painting Dusty Country Road commemorate the painter's visit to his homeland.
A cart is moving on the road slowly, stirring up the dust painted pink by the beams of the sun. This canvas is a pink vision flooded with light, a snapshot almost approaching plein-air painting. It sheds light on Munkácsy's new approach to Nature, and it also reveals a potential path, which the painter, unfortunately, never pursued. Contemporary critiques often called this small masterpiece impressionist: he himself, however, refused to have anything to do with this style. The only other painting in which such a painterly approach is evident is "Dusty Road I": in the paintings to come he returned to the style of realism.
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