Le port du Havre

Le port du Havre, at the Nantes Museum of Arts, shows Dufy's native city of Le Havre from a maritime perspective—a subject he would revisit in various media and styles across his long career. Painted in 1906, the harbor view gave him an occasion to deal with the density of ships, masts, and industrial waterfront architecture using the Fauve language of bold color and energetic stroke. The Nantes museum holds a fine collection of French painting extending from the seventeenth century through the twentieth.

The harbor's masts and rigging are indicated with rapid linear marks over fields of blue and grey, the water surface broken into short directional strokes that suggest reflected light and movement. Architecture along the quay is reduced to horizontal planes of warm ochre, providing tonal counterpoint to the predominantly cool waterscape.