Rouen, a major city in the Normandy region of France, is located about 140 kilometers northwest of the Île-de-France area. As a key hub along the Seine River before it flows into the English Channel, it has long held strategic importance in French history.
With its excellent port conditions, Rouen became a thriving center of commerce and trade, as well as a melting pot of history and culture. The Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen, founded in 1801 by order of Napoleon, houses the second-largest collection
of Impressionist paintings in France, second only to Paris. From 1892 to 1894, the renowned French Impressionist painter Claude Monet created his famous “Rouen Cathedral” series, inspired by the city’s own Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Rouen. The artwork, Rouen. Bateaux de commerce et péniches (Rouen Harbor and Barges), is part of the artist’s 1972 “Boats” series of landscape paintings. The artist composed this work with a horizontal format, adopting the perspective of an eagle soaring in the sky. Works from this series are rare,
concentrated in 1972, depicting the peak of France’s industrial development and maritime trade in the 1970s. The composition is meticulously refined, with boats bathed in golden-brown tones, signaling the artist’s creative peak during his mature period. In Rouen. Bateaux de commerce et péniches, the black lines resemble the precision of charcoal, with intricate interweaving of thick and thin strokes that build the structures and figurative elements of the landscape. Tugboats line up in succession, their low hums signaling their approach as they tow large barges filled with cargo. On the riverbank, commercial buildings stand side by side, with the cathedral’s towering spire rising in the distance, witnessing the city’s transformation between industrialization and history. The empty scene, combined with dense brushstrokes, conveys a sense of modernity tinged with subtle agitation, possibly reflecting the artist’s silent contemplation of the flourishing commerce and the passage of time in
history. Born in Paris in 1928, Buffet hailed from a family originating in northern France. From the age of seven, he would spend every summer with his family in Saint-Cast-le-Guildo, located at the northern tip of Brittany. The coastal landscapes of the North seemed to constantly surround Buffet’s art. His lifelong love for the sea and nature is evident throughout his paintings. Viewing Biffet’s 1972 “Ships” series of landscape paintings is like traveling through the major port cities of western France. The sight of small boats with billowing sails in seaside villages, or the grandeur of large ships entering the harbor, evokes a deep longing to visit these places in person.
Following in the tradition of French Baroque master Claude Lorrain (1600-1682), known for his “idealized landscapes,” and influenced by Monet’s exploration of visual light and shadow in his Rouen Cathedral series, as well as the powerful xpressiveness of the Fauvist Maurice de Vlaminck, Buffet synthesizes the artistic philosophies of past masters. He blends them with his personal style, leaving the world with a priceless artistic legacy