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Coastal Scene

Image credit: The National Gallery, London

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This cool, elegant painting explores the quality of light on water – how it moves, how it reflects and, towards the base of the picture, how it glows. The clouds are hardly reflected in the water: it seems as if the light has slipped under them to illuminate the vast, still stretch of almost tideless sea.

In 1886 in Paris, Théo van Rysselberghe saw Georges Seurat’s monumental painting Sunday Afternoon on the Ile de la Grande Jatte (now in the Art Institute of Chicago). He immediately realised the importance of Seurat’s new and startling technique, known as pointillism – myriad tiny dots of paint in complementary colours – and began to experiment with it himself.

The colours of Coastal Scene, and the absence of trees or buildings, make it appear a cold, northern seascape, but it’s thought to have been painted when van Rysselberghe was on the shores of the Mediterranean.

The National Gallery, London

London

Title

Coastal Scene

Date

about 1892

Medium

Oil on canvas

Measurements

H 51 x W 61 cm

Accession number

NG6582

Acquisition method

Bought, 2000

Work type

Painting

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Normally on display at

The National Gallery, London

Trafalgar Square, London, Greater London WC2N 5DN England

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