展品专文
Painted in 1874, the year of the First Impressionist exhibition in Paris, Bords de Seine à Bougival is a captivating example of the artist’s experiments with the effects of light and colour on the natural landscape. While the facture of broken brushstrokes, application of pure colour, and the studies en plein air are particularly evident in paintings such as the present work, Sisley's early canvases also exhibit a remarkable synthesis of spontaneity and structure — the latter perhaps best learnt from studying the great landscape works of Corot. Of Sisley’s conscious and clear-thinking approach, Christopher Lloyd writes that the "marks themselves are varied, [but] the visual effect is one of evenness. Similarly, the tonality of these paintings is satisfyingly bright… " (C. Lloyd, "Alfred Sisley and the Purity of Vision", Alfred Sisley, exh. cat., London, 1992, p. 13).
This apparent uniformity in Sisley's painting was nonetheless unrehearsed, deriving from the artist's immediate reaction to a specific scene or fleeting moment — such as the small rowing skiff in the present work, dwarfed by an expansive sky, making its way across the Seine towards a lone figure on the left riverbank. Despite the Seine’s importance as a thoroughfare for both commercial and recreational transit in and out of Paris at this time, Sisley prefers to focus on the tranquility of the landscape, only minimally suggesting the distant plumage of steam from tug boats further along the river, as it tumbles into clouds filling the top half of the canvas. The various marks the artist uses in one picture are enormously diverse as a result of Sisley’s particular concern for capturing individual textures as they are enveloped in light. He made very few preparatory drawings or studies; instead, Sisley seems to have painted directly onto the canvas throughout his career, finishing compositions such as Bords de Seine à Bougival while in front of the subject, and making relatively few revisions later in the studio.
Following the Prussian siege of Paris in 1871, Sisley relocated with his family to Louveciennes, a small village about thirty kilometres along the river Seine to the west of the capital. During his time there, the artist painted a number of scenes of the village, its winding streets and tree-lined roads, and often went for long walks to the neighbouring Bougival, the site of the present work, as well as Villeneuve-la-Garenne, Argenteuil and Ile de la Grande-Jatte. This new setting provided Sisley with a new creative impetus and, once settled, he started working with fresh energy. He explored the beauty of the Seine valley and took delight in capturing the effects of season, weather and time of day on the same locations in its countryside. Previously, fellow Impressionist Camille Pissarro had moved to Louveciennes for a year in 1869, returning intermittently after 1871; Claude Monet came to the village of Saint-Michel just north of Bougival for the summer of 1869, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir spent the same period in Louveciennes. All of these artists were essentially transient visitors to this area but it was Sisley who developed the sincerest devotion to the district and the river, which perhaps best explains the strength and consistency of his work to follow. On this contentment with both his style and setting, Raymond Cogniat writes, “Sisley’s art, like his life, was a blend of moderation and modesty, without violent contrasts or any taking of strong stands… It was an accurate and sincere expression of his nature; the proof of this is that the artist never sought to break away and try to find other routes to success. Never did he exhibit any desire to startle or surprise, or manifest the anxiety of those who try endlessly to renew themselves.” (R. Cogniat, Sisley, Näfels, 1978, pp. 73-74).
This apparent uniformity in Sisley's painting was nonetheless unrehearsed, deriving from the artist's immediate reaction to a specific scene or fleeting moment — such as the small rowing skiff in the present work, dwarfed by an expansive sky, making its way across the Seine towards a lone figure on the left riverbank. Despite the Seine’s importance as a thoroughfare for both commercial and recreational transit in and out of Paris at this time, Sisley prefers to focus on the tranquility of the landscape, only minimally suggesting the distant plumage of steam from tug boats further along the river, as it tumbles into clouds filling the top half of the canvas. The various marks the artist uses in one picture are enormously diverse as a result of Sisley’s particular concern for capturing individual textures as they are enveloped in light. He made very few preparatory drawings or studies; instead, Sisley seems to have painted directly onto the canvas throughout his career, finishing compositions such as Bords de Seine à Bougival while in front of the subject, and making relatively few revisions later in the studio.
Following the Prussian siege of Paris in 1871, Sisley relocated with his family to Louveciennes, a small village about thirty kilometres along the river Seine to the west of the capital. During his time there, the artist painted a number of scenes of the village, its winding streets and tree-lined roads, and often went for long walks to the neighbouring Bougival, the site of the present work, as well as Villeneuve-la-Garenne, Argenteuil and Ile de la Grande-Jatte. This new setting provided Sisley with a new creative impetus and, once settled, he started working with fresh energy. He explored the beauty of the Seine valley and took delight in capturing the effects of season, weather and time of day on the same locations in its countryside. Previously, fellow Impressionist Camille Pissarro had moved to Louveciennes for a year in 1869, returning intermittently after 1871; Claude Monet came to the village of Saint-Michel just north of Bougival for the summer of 1869, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir spent the same period in Louveciennes. All of these artists were essentially transient visitors to this area but it was Sisley who developed the sincerest devotion to the district and the river, which perhaps best explains the strength and consistency of his work to follow. On this contentment with both his style and setting, Raymond Cogniat writes, “Sisley’s art, like his life, was a blend of moderation and modesty, without violent contrasts or any taking of strong stands… It was an accurate and sincere expression of his nature; the proof of this is that the artist never sought to break away and try to find other routes to success. Never did he exhibit any desire to startle or surprise, or manifest the anxiety of those who try endlessly to renew themselves.” (R. Cogniat, Sisley, Näfels, 1978, pp. 73-74).