La scierie de Poitiers

A sawmill at Poitiers — 'la scierie de Poitiers' — represents Guillaumin's consistent interest in working industrial and craft infrastructure as legitimate painterly subject. Sawmills, like grinding mills and road construction sites, were part of the working landscape that Guillaumin treated with the same seriousness as natural scenery, reflecting both his social background and his Impressionist conviction that all aspects of contemporary reality deserved pictorial attention. Painted on cardboard, this undated work suggests a rapid sketch made on available materials during a visit to the Poitiers region — cardboard being used by Impressionists for quick studies when canvas was not at hand. Poitiers, the capital of the Vienne department in west-central France, was not among Guillaumin's most frequently painted locations, making this canvas a relatively unusual geographic document within his output.

Oil on cardboard with the looser, more immediate handling that the absorbent support encouraged. Cardboard was used by Impressionists for studies and rapid sketches when portability or economy required — it absorbed oil from the paint and produced a different surface texture from canvas. The sawmill's functional structures — saws, timber piles, workshop buildings — would be rendered with the practical directness that Guillaumin brought to all industrial subjects.