The Pond's Edge

Fine art from France: A large-scale painting on canvas, signed Paul Sébilleau (1847-1907). This beautiful piece shows a countryside landscape with the edge of a pond in the foreground. A village lays just beyond.

This scene has a beautiful depth created by the duality of the clear sky and the dark greenery. Sébilleau offers an aurora orange gradient that intersects the two landscapes (foreground and background) with finesse. The sky in silver and clay tones is worked with quick touches, offering relief but without thickness of material. The vegetation is denser but created in a more flattened style. The plant shades are mastered, the lines and colors of the trees remind us of the school of Barbizon, though  Sébilleau himself was of the impressionist line.

About the artist: Paul Sébilleau is part of the class of Bordeaux landscape painters who were influenced by Corot and Courbet. The Gironde, Antibes, Juan-les-Pins, and the Dordogne were his favorite subjects. Sébilleau exhibited in Parisian salons, Bordeaux and in the USA.