Constanta Art Museum

Nicolae Grigorescu, Flori de nalbă, ulei pe carton, 300 x 170

„The Bank of the Seine”

Rudolf SCHWEITZER–CUMPĂNA (1886–1975)

The painting was made in 1932, when the artist was in Paris. It is individualized by the decorative note of thick touches, in serious and deep tones, with contrasting shades: ocher, yellow, white – for rendering the Seine quay and brown, gray, blue, black – for rendering the bridge and the cityscape in the background. As for the technique used to render expressiveness, the artist is known for building embossed shapes, modeling the paste, sometimes excessively abundant. In the foreground is the roof of some buildings in chromatic agreement with the bridge, framed in the dull landscape, painted in an impressionistic way, with dense brushstrokes and games of light and shadow. The silhouette of the city is outlined towards the horizon, with barely suggested buildings, in the shades of blue-gray of the Seine, with short horizontal brushstrokes, which gives staticity to the image. The bridge and the city in the background are the main horizontal lines of the painting, furrowed by the concreteness of the vertical lines of the bridge legs, which give height and depth to the composition. In addition to the concrete silhouette of the emblematic bridge, the shapes are not well delimited, there are chromatic passages that give unity to the composition. The strong and contrasting chromatic language, the deep lights and shadows, create an image, which invites introspection.