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Lot Essay
Painted at the high point of the artist's divisionniste period, the present work is a preparatory painting for the monumental L'heure embrasée of the same year, considered as one of the most important pictorial achievements of van Rysselberghe's oeuvre and currently at the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Weimar.
Van Rysselberghe longed to tackle the theme of bathers, and was greatly influenced by the works of Botticelli on his visit to Florence in 1890. The genesis of this work can be traced back as early as 1895 when the artist excitedly wrote to Van Velde: 'Tu sais que je suis très en mal d'enfantement de 'ma toile' en décor clair et tendre auquel je rêve, peuplé de femmes s'ébattant près de l'eau: prétexte à lignes et gammes joyeuses' (T. van Rysselberghe, quoted in R. Feltkamp, Théo van Rysselberghe, 1862-1926, Brussels, 2003, pp. 62-63). His preparation for the execution of this painting was exhaustive, as evidenced in his letter to Lucien Pissarro in 1895: 'Je me prépare à partir bientôt pour Saint-Tropez où je vais faire des études pour le décor de ma toile des baigneuses; j'aurai là-bas des éléments que je ne trouve pas dans ce pays-ci: arbres etc. près de la mer, en silhouette' (ibid., p. 63).
This canvas demonstrates the artist's mastery of the pointillist technique that Georges Seurat had pioneered in the mid-1880s. Rejecting the spontaneous and irregular brushwork of the Impressionists, the practitioners of divisionism favoured a precise, methodical application of pigment governed by the scientific principles of colour theory. This technique is used to a wonderful effect in the present work as the pink, mauve, orange hues attain an incredible luminosity, suffusing the sinuous nude bathers with incredible warmth.
Francis Viélé Griffin, seated third from the left in van Rysselberghe's famous 1903 painting La Lecture (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Ghent), was the first owner of the present painting, indeed the work was dedicated to him by the artist. The American-born French poet, an important figure in the French Symbolist movement, was a close friend of the artist's, and was kept well informed of progress on L'heure embrasée: 'Le grand tableau, peu à peu, se couvre: c'est la période un peu pénible; mais bientôt je serrerai les formes et exalterai les orangés, les roses et les roux ardents...la grande toile avance. Mais à mesure qu'elle s'allume, la difficulté de la mise d'accord des ombres et de la lumière, intensémentBrosée et dorée, augmente' (ibid., p. 64).
Van Rysselberghe longed to tackle the theme of bathers, and was greatly influenced by the works of Botticelli on his visit to Florence in 1890. The genesis of this work can be traced back as early as 1895 when the artist excitedly wrote to Van Velde: 'Tu sais que je suis très en mal d'enfantement de 'ma toile' en décor clair et tendre auquel je rêve, peuplé de femmes s'ébattant près de l'eau: prétexte à lignes et gammes joyeuses' (T. van Rysselberghe, quoted in R. Feltkamp, Théo van Rysselberghe, 1862-1926, Brussels, 2003, pp. 62-63). His preparation for the execution of this painting was exhaustive, as evidenced in his letter to Lucien Pissarro in 1895: 'Je me prépare à partir bientôt pour Saint-Tropez où je vais faire des études pour le décor de ma toile des baigneuses; j'aurai là-bas des éléments que je ne trouve pas dans ce pays-ci: arbres etc. près de la mer, en silhouette' (ibid., p. 63).
This canvas demonstrates the artist's mastery of the pointillist technique that Georges Seurat had pioneered in the mid-1880s. Rejecting the spontaneous and irregular brushwork of the Impressionists, the practitioners of divisionism favoured a precise, methodical application of pigment governed by the scientific principles of colour theory. This technique is used to a wonderful effect in the present work as the pink, mauve, orange hues attain an incredible luminosity, suffusing the sinuous nude bathers with incredible warmth.
Francis Viélé Griffin, seated third from the left in van Rysselberghe's famous 1903 painting La Lecture (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Ghent), was the first owner of the present painting, indeed the work was dedicated to him by the artist. The American-born French poet, an important figure in the French Symbolist movement, was a close friend of the artist's, and was kept well informed of progress on L'heure embrasée: 'Le grand tableau, peu à peu, se couvre: c'est la période un peu pénible; mais bientôt je serrerai les formes et exalterai les orangés, les roses et les roux ardents...la grande toile avance. Mais à mesure qu'elle s'allume, la difficulté de la mise d'accord des ombres et de la lumière, intensémentBrosée et dorée, augmente' (ibid., p. 64).