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Scène d'été, or Summer Scene, is an oil-on-canvas painting by the French artist Frédéric Bazille, completed in 1869, a year before his death in 1870, and now in the Fogg Art Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The impressionist painting depicts young men dressed in swimsuits having a leisurely day along the banks of the river Lez near Montpellier. Bazille achieved the look he wanted for the painting by first drawing the human figures in his Paris studio and then transporting the drawings to the outdoor setting. Like his earlier painting Réunion de famille (1850), Scène d'été captures friends and family members in the outdoors and was exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1870.[1]

It may have been an inspiration for Thomas Eakins' The Swimming Hole (1885), as Eakins was in Paris in 1870 and could have seen Bazille's painting.[2]

Background

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After the rejection by the Paris Salon of Bazille's similar work, Le Pêcheur à L'épervier (1868), Bazille was spurred to paint a larger and more ambitious work, including not two, but eight figures set in nature. He sought to create a more developed and mature painting, set in the same style and evoking similar sentiments. Bazille first conceived of Scène d'été in April, 1869, and initially intended the work to depict nude figures, as revealed by his personal letters.[3] He also planned for the work to be the crowning achievement of his exploration of figures set in an open-air ('plein-air') setting.[4] The subject of bathing, then, provided Bazille with the ability to combine his studies of the nude with this desire to explore the plein-air setting.[5]

 
Study for Scène d'été (1869), Frédéric Bazille, Paris, Musée du Louvre

The work is the result of long and arduous planning by Bazille, as demonstrated by the numerous sketches and drawings that depict Bazille's original plans for the painting. Specifically, in addition to the many rough sketches, Bazille created the only known drawing of the work as a whole, which is currently part of the collection at the Musée du Louvre, Paris. Rather than the eight figures depicted in Scène d'été, the drawing consists only of seven, with four of them—the young man reclining, the figure in the front-left, and the two wrestlers in the background—placed in the same location as in the final painting.[6] Additionally, the wrestling figures in the center of the canvas are locked together more rigorously in the painting than in the drawing, while the boy in the water below is more-or-less floating with his head briefly turned to the left, unlike in the drawing, where the boy adopts a more natural swimming pose.[7] The rough sketches found in Bazille's sketchbook depict variations of the figures found in the drawing and final painting, demonstrating how Bazille meticulously planned the poses of each figure. The two wrestling figures are drawn multiple times in various interlocking grips, and another of these sketches showcases a seated figure with his back turned to the spectator, likely revealing another figure Bazille refrained from including in the final work.[8]

Composition

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Scène d'été consists of eight male figures basking and bathing on the banks of the river Lez, near Méric.[9] Apart from the two wrestlers in the center of the work, the figures are shaded by White Poplar trees, with Bazille emphasizing their color using bright green-yellow.[10] Through Scène d'été, Bazille demonstrates his mastery of light. He exhibits the vivid sunlight of the summer day by painting distinct, high-contrast areas of dark and light, and by the use of bright colors, from the light greens and yellows of the foliage, to the red and blue bathing suits, the darker greens and blues for the shaded regions, the bright blue sky, and the light tan, beige, and pink for the skin of the figures.[11]

The composition of Scène d'été is rather simple, and Bazille's style showcases strict uniformity and thus naturalness.[12] In terms of technique, Bazille shies away from loose or spontaneous brushwork, rather opting to define the landscape through thin, detailed lines and shapes.[13] Critically, the buildings in the distant background modernize the scene, making the work distinct from the bright, naturalist works of the Renaissance, as well as cementing the scene as a depiction of Bazille's own surroundings, rather than of an ancient or Arcadian stage. Further evidence of modernity in the painting is highlighted by the figures being clothed rather than nude—time-accurate given Montpellier's restriction of nude bathing in the Lez.[14]

Through Scène d'été, Bazille demonstrates the connection between his work and the larger realist movement, as this work, in particular, showcases ordinary events of everyday life as Bazille saw them.[15] As art historian François Daulte describes, Bazille, in Scène d'été, creates a harmony between the bodies, the trees, and the clouds, in some ways to evoke renaissance or even classical sentiments.[16] Bazille further evokes renaissance art through the composition's symmetry, the square shape of the canvas, which was particularly unusual at the time, and through the boldness and vividness of the color palette.[17] Here, the subject of the painting is important as well. While, Bazille evokes work and themes of art of the past, Scène d'été is also innovative, especially given that it takes themes usually associated with the female nude, and reinvents them according to both principles of modernity and notions of masculinity.[18]

Inspiration

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Jacopo Bassano, The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian (1574), Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon

Though Bazille's Scène d'été brings about modern, alternative sentiments, the poses of some of the figures, at the very least, share a strong semblance to figures in older paintings. The figure in the left of the foreground, leaning against the tree, closely resembles the primary figure in Jacopo Bassano's The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian (1574), sharing both the same location on the canvas and the similarity in pose. Bazille would have even seen this painting at the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon in 1868, and Bazille drew the St. Sebastian figure itself in one of his sketchbooks. Next, the reclining man on the riverbank evokes the reclining figure of Laurent de la Hyre's Landscape with Shepherd Playing the Flute (1647), a painting belonging to the Musée Fabre in Montpellier itself. Additionally, the seated figure undressing, seen in Bazille's preparatory drawings but not included in the final painting, recalls the figure doing the same in Nicolas Poussin's St. John Baptizes the People (1635-37), located at the Musée du Louvre, Paris.[19] Finally, the wrestlers in the center of the canvas likely drew inspiration from Gustave Courbet's The Wrestlers (1853), which features two male figures, clothed similarly to the figures of Scène d'été, engaged in a wrestling match akin to the two figures doing the same in Bazille's work.[20]

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The following are the various sketches that depict Bazille's planning for the figures and elements in Scène d'été, all of which currently reside at the Musée du Louvre, Paris. These sketches demonstrate the rigorous process and planning Bazille undertook in preparing to paint the final work.

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  1. ^ "Frédéric Bazille". Biography.com. Retrieved 4 July 2017.
  2. ^ Glueck, Grace (September 3, 2004). "European Influences On Americans' Views". The New York Times. Retrieved December 3, 2012.
  3. ^ Tinterow, Gary; Loyrette, Henri; Galeries Nationales d'Exposition du Grand Palais; Metropolitan Museum of Art, eds. (1994). Origins of impressionism: conjunction with the exhibition held at the Galerie Nationales du Grand Palais, April 19 - August 8, 1994, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, September 27, 1994 - January 8, 1995. New York, NY: Abrams. ISBN 978-0-87099-717-4.
  4. ^ Hilaire, Michel; Perrin, Paul (2016). Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism. Montpellier: Musée Fabre. p. 41. ISBN 978-2-0813-9852-8.
  5. ^ Hilaire, Michel; Perrin, Paul (2016). Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism. Montpellier: Musée Fabre. p. 138. ISBN 978-2-0813-9852-8.
  6. ^ Bazille, Frédéric; Jourdan, Aleth; Musée Fabre; Brooklyn Museum; Dixon Gallery and Gardens, eds. (1992). Frédéric Bazille: prophet of impressionism ; [exhibition Frédéric Bazille, Pavillion du Musee Fabre, Montpelier, July 9 - October 4, 1992; the Brooklyn Museum, November 13, 1992 - January 24, 1993; the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis, February 14 - April 25, 1993]. Brooklyn, N.Y: Brooklyn Museum. ISBN 978-0-87273-129-5.
  7. ^ Pitman, Dianne W. (1998). Bazille: purity, pose and painting in the 1860s. University Park (Pa.): Pennsylvania state university press. ISBN 978-0-271-01700-6.
  8. ^ Bazille, Frédéric; Jourdan, Aleth; Musée Fabre; Brooklyn Museum; Dixon Gallery and Gardens, eds. (1992). Frédéric Bazille: prophet of impressionism ; [exhibition Frédéric Bazille, Pavillion du Musee Fabre, Montpelier, July 9 - October 4, 1992; the Brooklyn Museum, November 13, 1992 - January 24, 1993; the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis, February 14 - April 25, 1993]. Brooklyn, N.Y: Brooklyn Museum. ISBN 978-0-87273-129-5.
  9. ^ Tinterow, Gary; Loyrette, Henri; Galeries Nationales d'Exposition du Grand Palais; Metropolitan Museum of Art, eds. (1994). Origins of impressionism: conjunction with the exhibition held at the Galerie Nationales du Grand Palais, April 19 - August 8, 1994, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, September 27, 1994 - January 8, 1995. New York, NY: Abrams. ISBN 978-0-87099-717-4.
  10. ^ Hilaire, Michel; Perrin, Paul (2016). Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism. Montpellier: Musée Fabre. pp. 41, 138. ISBN 978-2-0813-9852-8.
  11. ^ Hilaire, Michel; Perrin, Paul (2016). Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism. Montpellier: Musée Fabre. p. 143. ISBN 978-2-0813-9852-8.
  12. ^ Maxon, John (1963). "Bazille". The Art Institute of Chicago Quarterly. 57 (2): 22–24. ISSN 1935-6609.
  13. ^ Pitman, Dianne W.; Champa, Kermit Swiler; Brenneman, David A. (1999). Monet & Bazille: a collaboration [catalog of an exhibition held at the High museum of art, Atlanta, Ga., Feb. 27-May 16, 1999]. New York: H. N. Abrams. ISBN 978-0-8109-6384-9.
  14. ^ Pitman, Dianne W. (1998). Bazille: purity, pose and painting in the 1860s. University Park (Pa.): Pennsylvania state university press. ISBN 978-0-271-01700-6.
  15. ^ Mühsam, Gerd, ed. (1970). French painters and paintings from the fourteenth century to post-impressionism. A Library of Art Criticism. New York: Ungar. ISBN 978-0-8044-3210-8.
  16. ^ Daulte, François (1992). Frédéric Bazille et les débuts de l'impressionnisme: catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint. Paris: la Bibliothèque des arts. ISBN 978-2-85047-182-7.
  17. ^ Bazille, Frédéric; Jourdan, Aleth; Musée Fabre; Brooklyn Museum; Dixon Gallery and Gardens, eds. (1992). Frédéric Bazille: prophet of impressionism ; [exhibition Frédéric Bazille, Pavillion du Musee Fabre, Montpelier, July 9 - October 4, 1992; the Brooklyn Museum, November 13, 1992 - January 24, 1993; the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis, February 14 - April 25, 1993]. Brooklyn, N.Y: Brooklyn Museum. ISBN 978-0-87273-129-5.
  18. ^ Chu, Petra ten-Doesschate (2012). Nineteenth-century European art (3. ed ed.). Boston, Mass.: Prentice Hall. p. 405. ISBN 978-0-205-70799-7. {{cite book}}: |edition= has extra text (help)
  19. ^ Hilaire, Michel; Perrin, Paul (2016). Frédéric Bazille and the Birth of Impressionism. Montpellier: Musée Fabre. p. 143. ISBN 978-2-0813-9852-8.
  20. ^ Tinterow, Gary; Loyrette, Henri; Galeries Nationales d'Exposition du Grand Palais; Metropolitan Museum of Art, eds. (1994). Origins of impressionism: conjunction with the exhibition held at the Galerie Nationales du Grand Palais, April 19 - August 8, 1994, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, September 27, 1994 - January 8, 1995. New York, NY: Abrams. ISBN 978-0-87099-717-4.
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