Gustave Caillebotte

In 1881 Gustave Caillebotte moved to Le Petit-Gennevilliers, a small village on the Seine River adjacent to the Parisian suburb of Argenteuil where Claude Monet had lived from 1871 to 1878. A resort location famous for its boat rides and sailing regattas, the area offered appealing motifs for the enthusiastic water sportsman. In many of his works, Caillebotte chose views that had already been painted before him by Monet and other Impressionists. One such motif was an imposing pedestrian bridge, originally designed in 1830–31 and repaired at great expense following its destruction in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71.

Unlike Monet’s 1874 painting The Bridge at Argenteuil (Neue Pinakothek, Munich), Caillebotte’s version of the motif shows an unusual close-up view from below that includes only one of the seven elegantly curving arches of the iron bridge. The omission of the stone pier to the right creates a sense of openness, which in turn is counteracted by the dark metal structure limiting the space in the upper half of the composition. Only a narrow blue strip of sky appears beyond the railing, and the traditional evocation of spatial depth in a landscape through clearly defined foreground, middle ground, and background zones is negated.

Both the striking perspective—reminiscent of a photographic snapshot—and the thematic focus on an impressive feat of engineering recall Caillebotte’s images of modern industrial architecture in the Quartier de l’Europe in Paris, painted in the late 1870s. But while pictures such as On the Pont de l’Europe (1876–77, Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth) still embraced the meticulous, polished execution of academic tradition, The Argenteuil Bridge and the Seine shows the shimmering daubs of glowing color and dynamic brushwork characteristic of Impressionism. The subtle play of light and shadow and the many intersecting reflections of color on the surface of the water point to the influence of painters such as Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, as does the interest in the depiction of a transitory moment.

The Argenteuil Bridge and the Seine was included in a retrospective exhibition of 122 paintings by Caillebotte organized by the Parisian art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel a few months after the artist’s death in February 1894. In the catalogue raisonné of Caillebotte’s paintings compiled by Marie Berhaut, it is listed as no. 334.

Daniel Zamani

Exposition rétrospective d'œuvres de Gustave Caillebotte, Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris, 1894, no. 21

Caillebotte et ses amis Impressionnistes: Cézanne, Manet, Sisley, Renoir, Musée de Chartres, June 18–September 5, 1965, no. 23

Le Centenaire de l'Impressionnisme, Ginza Matsuzakaya, Tokyo, July 25–August 11, 1974; Sapporo Matsuzakaya; Osaka Matsuzakaya; Musée préfectoral, Yamaguchi; Nagoya Matsuzakaya; Shizuoka Matsuzakaya; Ueno Matsuzakaya, Tokyo, August/November 1974, no. 6

Gustave Caillebotte: A Retrospective Exhibition, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, October 22, 1976–January 2, 1977; Brooklyn Museum, New York, February 12–April 24., 1977, no. 64

L'Impressionnisme et le paysage français, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, June 28–September 16, 1984; Art Institute of Chicago, October 23, 1984–January 6, 1985; Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, February 4–April 22, 1985, no. 51

Gustave Caillebotte: Urban Impressionist, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, September 12, 1994–January 9, 1995; The Art Institute of Chicago, February 15–May 28, 1995, no. 97

Gustave Caillebotte: The Unknown Impressionist, Royal Academy of Arts, London, March 28–June 23, 1996, no. 42

Impressionists on the Seine: A Celebration of Renoir’s „Luncheon of the Boating Party“, The Phillips Collection, Washington, September 1, 1996–February 28, 1997, no. 5

Seurat and the Bathers, The National Gallery, London, July 2–September 28, 1997

The Impressionist at Argenteuil, National Gallery of Art, Washington; Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, 2000, no. 29

Gustave Caillebotte: The Painter’s Eye, National Gallery of Art, Washington, June 28–October 4, 2015; Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, November 8, 2015–February 14, 2016

Impressionism: The Art of Landscape, Museum Barberini, Potsdam, January 21–May 28, 2017

Impressionism in the Age of Industry, AGO Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, February 16–May 5, 2019

The Impressionists and Photography, Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, October 15, 2019–January 26, 2020

Impressionism: The Hasso Plattner Collection, Museum Barberini, Potsdam, from September 5, 2020

ca. 1885, Eugène Lamy, Paris
1894, Edmond Décap, Paris
n.d., Depeaux-Décap, inherited from the above
n.d., Maurice Barret-Décap, Paris
December 12, 1929, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, Maurice Barret-Décap Collection, lot 2
n.d., Miran Eknayan, Paris
n.d., Galerie Brame & Lorenceau, Paris
July 10, 1963, Josefowitz, Switzerland, acquired from the above
November 6, 2008, Christie’s, New York, lot 36, consigned by the above
Private collection, Europe, acquired at the above sale
November 2, 2011, Sotheby’s, New York, lot 17
Private collection, acquired at the above sale
January 2015, purchased from a private collection

Caillebotte et ses amis Impressionnistes: Cézanne, Manet, Sisley, Renoir, exh. cat. Musée de Chartres 1965, no. 23

Le Centenaire de l'Impressionnisme, exh. cat. Ginza Matsuzakaya, Tokyo 1974, no. 6

Gustave Caillebotte: A Retrospective Exhibition, exh. cat. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston 1976, no. 64, ill. p. 30

Marie Berhaut, Caillebotte, sa vie et son œuvre: Catalogue raisonné des peintures et pastels, Paris 1978, no. 310, ill. p. 186

L'Impressionnisme et le paysage français, exh. cat. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles 1985, no. 51

Kirk Varnedoe, Gustave Caillebotte, New Haven 1987, no. 55

Marie-Josèphe de Balanda, Gustave Caillebotte: La vie, la technique, l’œuvre peint, Lausanne 1988, p. 132, ill. p. 133

Jean Louis Ferrier, L'Aventure de l'art au XIXeme siècle, Paris 1991, ill. p. 724

Éric Darragon, Gustave Caillebotte, Vaduz 1994, p. 110/11

Anne Distel and Rodolphe Rapetti, “Exposer Caillebotte,” in Connaissance des arts (1994), no. 26, p. 27

Jean-Marie Baron, Caillebotte Impressionniste, Paris 1994, ill. p. 2

Marie Berhaut, Gustave Caillebotte: Catalogue raisonné des peintures et pastels, Paris 1994, no. 334, ill. p. 198

Stéphane Guégan, L'ABCdaire de Caillebotte, Paris 1994, p. 16/17

Gustave Caillebotte: 1848–1894, exh. cat. Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris 1994, no. 106, p. 283, ill. p. 282

“Paysages de banlieue. Un thème moderne,” in Le petit journal des grandes expositions (1994), p. 11, ill. p. 12

Impressionists on the Seine: A Celebration of Renoir’s „Luncheon of the Boating Party“, exh. cat. The Phillips Collection, Washington 1996, no. 5

Gustave Caillebotte: The Unknown Impressionist, exh. cat. Royal Academy of Arts, London 1996, no. 42, ill. p. 164

The Impressionists at Argenteuil, exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington 2000, no. 29, p. 116, ill. p. 117

Gustave Caillebotte: The Painter’s Eye, exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington 2015, no. 48, p. 278, ill. p. 221

Michael Marrinan, Gustave Caillebotte: Painting the Paris of Naturalism, 1872–1887, Los Angeles 2016, p. 346–49, ill. p. 346

Impressionism: The Art of Landscape, exh. cat. Museum Barberini, Potsdam 2017, no. 33, p. 18, ill. p. 139

The Impressionists and Photography, exh. cat. Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid 2019, no. 89, p. 141, ill. p. 153