Émilie CharmyFrench
L'Estaque
May one see it?
Yes, receiving visitors
Art Institute of Chicago
Room391Chicago, United States
On public display.
- Checked
- In this state since
- Source
- The museum
About the painting
Émilie Charmy was among the first women to exhibit paintings in the Fauvist style. Traveling to rugged sites on France’s Mediterranean coast, such as L’Estaque, depicted here, she created landscapes suffused with emotion and subjective expression. Laying down vibrant color in broad unstructured planes, she composed the scene as a collection of loosely joined organic forms. The swelling and tapering shapes along the composition’s edges produce a dynamic sense of movement that dissipates at the center, where we glimpse the calm waters of the Bay of Marseille.
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Charmy was celebrated during her lifetime, but the accolades she received feel wildly gendered today. In 1921, for example, a French writer described her as an artist who “sees like a woman and paints like a man…from the one she takes grace and from the other strength, and this is what makes her such a strange and powerful painter who holds our attention.”
Art Institute of ChicagoCC BY 4.0
Particulars
- Accession number
- 1931.518
What it shows
In the catalog
Sources
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Image: Art Institute of Chicago — © the artist or rights holder
