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Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde, Paul Signac

 

Honestly, I’m a little torn between “Ooh! An interesting variation on a landscape!” and “Eh, it’s a landscape.”

On the plus side, I like the palette. I especially like the vividness of the boats. On the down side, it makes me a little impatient, which strikes me as kind of funny because if this were a mosaic made of little stone tiles, I’d probably be absolutely riveted.

In attempting to answer the question what the fundamental difference is between the techniques of paint blots used by impressionists in general and the dots of color used by pointilists, I did discover that Signac is generally considered a pointilist. These points don’t look the same as Seurat’s to me; maybe Signac was just an impatient pointilist? I can empathize.

The silliest thing I have to say about the painting is that when you go to the Met’s page on it and zoom, at least on my computer and with my network, it takes a little while for the resolution to come in, so the blurry dots gradually become more distinct, which is kind of trippy. I have to think that Signac would have enjoyed seeing how the technology affects the way we see the art.

Credit: http://www.metmuseum.org:

Artist Paul Signac (French, 1863–1935)
TitleNotre-Dame-de-la-Garde (La Bonne-Mère), Marseilles
Date1905–6
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions35 x 45 3/4 in. (88.9 x 116.2 cm)
ClassificationPaintings
Credit LineGift of Robert Lehman, 1955
Accession Number55.220.1

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