View of the Seine at Herblay

Herblay, on the Seine northwest of Paris, was one of the riverside villages Signac visited during his early career when he was still primarily a painter of the Île-de-France landscape. The Seine at Herblay views date from around 1889-1890, a period when he was systematically applying divisionist theory to the range of landscape types available within day-trip distance of Paris. The calm river surface at Herblay, with its complex reflections of overhanging vegetation and sky, provided an ideal subject for demonstrating optical mixture: the water was a natural arena in which multiple colors from different sources merged.

The river surface dominates the composition, built from divisionist dots in blues, greens, and reflected warm tones of the riverbank vegetation. Signac uses the contrast between the relatively detailed bank and its simplified, optically mixed reflection in the water as the compositional engine of the painting.