Constant Troyon's "Four Oxen Pulling a Plough" demonstrates the artist's masterful rendering of rural labor through a mixed media approach combining black chalk, gouache, graphite, and gum Arabic. The squared composition indicates this was a preparatory study intended for transfer to a larger work, a common practice among academic painters of the 19th century. Troyon's careful attention to the muscular forms of the oxen and the textural details of the landscape reflects his commitment to naturalistic representation in Barbizon school tradition.