The Banks of the Marne at Charenton

By 1895, when Guillaumin painted this view of the Marne riverbanks at Charenton, he had been financially independent for four years following his lottery win and could dedicate his full attention to painting. Charenton-le-Pont, at the confluence of the Marne and the Seine just southeast of Paris, had been a subject for him since the late 1860s and early 1870s — it was accessible from the city, offered working-class river scenes without tourism, and provided the kind of unpretentious riverscape that suited his vision. By 1895 his technique had evolved considerably from the controlled brushwork of his early industrial landscapes: the strokes are broader, the colour more emphatic, the compositional structure more assured. The Cleveland Museum of Art holds this canvas alongside the Sédelle frost painting, giving the institution a useful range of Guillaumin's geographic and seasonal range. The work represents a mature revisiting of a youthful subject, the familiar riverbanks now painted with the full confidence of an artist who had outlasted critical neglect.

Oil on canvas with the broad, assured handling of Guillaumin's middle period. The riverbanks are built from overlapping strokes in varied greens and ochres, with the water surface handled through horizontal dabs of reflected light. The composition is relatively simple — bank, water, far bank, sky — with its quality residing entirely in the sensitivity of the colour relationships and the confidence of the touch.