Seurat, Georges

Le port de Gravelines

1890; Oil on canvas. 28 3/4 x 36 1/2 in; Signed, bottom right; The Indianapolis Museum of Art. Gift in memory of Daniel W. and Elizabeth C. Marmon

This is a canvas that presents in one compact vision the air of the harbor and of the sea. An impression of stability is supplied by the bollards along the sea wall casting their shadows in the direction of the channel. The rest is infinity, the infinity of a perspective in an elegant parabola, seemingly a prelude to the immensity of the sea, here perfectly calm and inducing to calm. The free, full, modulated space which cuts the painting in two gives off utter serenity: the lighthouse, the boats at anchor, and the harbor cut across by one sweeping diagonal to provide the contrasting movement.

This painting is luminous, flooded with light and sunshine, rather high in color; it contrasts with the evening effect of the channel scene in the William A. M. Burden collection. As Lucie Cousturier observed of Seurat, ``he could sit in front of any bench, tree, or wall which others had previously depicted, and his own vision would not be influenced one particle.''

The canvas was exhibited at the Exposition des XX in Brussels, and at the Independants of 1891 with The Circus. There exists one study for it on a panel which was owned by Maximillien Luce.