Image scanned/or photographed from transparency and color corrected by Pat Cagney.

Fishing Boat on the Beach

Artist Jules Dupré (French, 1811-1889)

Dateca. 1870

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsOverall: 29 x 36 1/2 in. (73.7 x 92.7 cm)
Overall, Frame: 39 x 46 1/2 in. (99.1 x 118.1 cm)

ClassificationsEuropean art

Credit LineGift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.

Object number77.414

Terms

Boats
Fishing
Beach

Collections

European Art before 1945

On View

Not on view

DescriptionThis is an oil on canvas painting. The horizon line divides the picture plane into two-thirds sky and one-third beach with a very narrow strip depicting the ocean (approximately one inch wide). The sand is a neutral beige/gray and there is a large boat, nearly centered on the canvas. It is beached, leaning to one side. There is a shallow pool in the foreground reflecting part of the boat. The sky is pale and filled with billowing cumulous clouds. There are two more ships on the sea in the distance.

Label TextJules Dupré French, 1811–1889 Fishing Boat on the Beach, ca. 1870 Oil on canvas Jules Dupré’s subject—a fishing boat beached at low tide—was a staple of 19th-century French marine painting. Consider Eugène Boudin’s treatment of a similar subject on the wall to your right. Unlike Boudin’s well-attended fleet of fishing craft, the lone boat shown here seems abandoned and forlorn. Artists have long used sailing ships to symbolize the human soul voyaging on the sea of life. Perhaps this ragged, stranded craft evokes an aspect of the human condition: our helplessness against the forces of nature. Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. 77.414