喬治·秀拉

Léon Appert, Paris (the artist's brother-in-law; probably until 1925)

Mme Léon Roussel, Paris (by descent from the above)

Private Collection, Paris (sold: Ader Picard Tajan, Paris, 22nd June 1988, lot 3)

Private Collection, Paris (purchased at the above sale)

Acquired by the present owner in 2010

Paris, Musée Jacquemart-André, Seurat, 1957, no. 44 (titled Port-en-Bessin)

Indianapolis, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Seurat at Gravelines: The Last Landscapes, 1990, no. 8, illustrated in the catalogue

Paris, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais & New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Seurat, 1991-92, no. 222 (in Paris); no. 224 (in New York), illustrated in the catalogue (titled Un Soir, dessin pour 'Gravelines: un soir')

Henri Dorra & John Rewald, Seurat, l'œuvre peint. Biographie et catalogue critique, Paris, 1959, no. 202a, illustrated p. 262 (titled Crépuscule, étude pour 'Gravelines, un soir')

Joseph-Emile Muller, Seurat, dessins, Paris, 1960, illustrated p. 35 (titled Le Chenal de Gravelines)

César M. de Hauke, Seurat et son œuvre, Paris, 1961, vol. II, no. 696, illustrated p. 289 (titled Un Soir, Port-en-Bessin)

Robert L. Herbert, Seurat's Drawings, New York, 1962, pl. 135, illustrated p. 155

André Chastel & Fiorella Minervino, Tout l'œuvre peint de Seurat, Paris, 1973, no. D71, illustrated p. 110 (titled Crépuscule, étude pour 'Gravelines, un soir')

Richard Thomson, Seurat, Oxford, 1985, mentioned p. 173

Michael F. Zimmermann, Seurat and the Art Theory of his Time, Antwerp, 1991, no. 590, illustrated p. 439

Executed on white laid paper, not laid down, attached to the mount on the reverse of the top two corners, floating in the mount. There is some slight staining around the edges from previous mounting. Apart from a very small repaired tear at the centre of the top edge, and three very small tears towards the right of the top edge, this work is in very good condition. Colours: Overall fairly accurate in the printed catalogue illustration, although the paper tone is less green and more neutral in the original.
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Un soir, Gravelines was executed in the summer of 1890, during Seurat’s stay on the Channel coast. The small port town of Gravelines, situated in the far north of France, between Calais and Dunkirk, provided a peaceful atmosphere for the artist to work from nature. During his stay there, Seurat painted some of his most vibrant landscapes, including Le Chenal de Gravelines: un soir (fig. 1), now in The Museum of Modern Art, New York, for which the present drawing is the most closely related study.

 

The present composition, a beautiful example of Seurat’s mastery of the Conté crayon medium, is framed by the vertical line of the signalling mast on the left and the gentle curve of the mole in the foreground. The quay running horizontally across the sheet separates the Aa estuary and the expanse of the sea, with the houses of Grand-Fort-Philippe seen behind it. Robert L. Herbert wrote about the present work: ‘this composition appears as the most satisfyingly complete of the Gravelines drawings. Its sky bears the delicate lines and rubbings of Seurat’s late drawings, which here seem appropriate to the pervasive light of the flattened-out Channel coast’ (R. L. Herbert in Seurat (exhibition catalogue), op. cit., 1991-92, p. 357).