Esquisse pour la mairie d'Asnières : Paysage. Quais de la Seine à Asnières

Esquisse pour la mairie d'Asnières: Paysage. Quais de la Seine à Asnières shows the Seine riverbank at Asnières — the same stretch of river that Seurat immortalized a generation earlier in his paintings of bathing and boating. By 1901 the Asnières bank had changed from Seurat's time, industrialization pressing closer to the water's edge. Schmitt's sketch for the mairie commission preserves a view of the river at a transitional moment, the decorative pastoral tradition of municipal art encountering a landscape increasingly shaped by industrial Paris.

The Seine is treated as a bright horizontal element anchoring the composition. Schmitt captures the riverside landscape with quick, summary strokes — trees, embankment, and sky organized in broad tonal bands. The handling is practical rather than ambitious.