Léon-François-Antoine Fleury

French, 1804 - 1858

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Cotton-white and slate-gray clouds drift and churn across a pale blue sky over a grassy hill that slopes to the edge of a placid body of water in this horizontal painting on paper. The horizon comes about a fifth of the way up the composition, and the scene is loosely painted so many of the brushstrokes are visible. Closest to us, two people with peach-colored skin are on a beach piled with smoke-gray and caramel-brown boulders. Both people wear dark vests over long-sleeved, white shirts and knee-length white pants. They are loosely painted so it is difficult to tell if they wear dark caps or have dark hair. One bends double to reach toward the sand, and the other stands and seems to watch, perhaps holding a brown sack over one shoulder. In the near distance to our left, a grassy hill rises steeply from the water’s edge from behind a stone wall. A couple touches of gray paint suggest smoke rising from chimneys in the town beyond. About a dozen masted ships, most with their sails tied up, line the harbor across the water from us. The water shifts from deep teal-blue in front of the hill, to our left, to aquamarine and fog-blue to our right. Ripples gently break around a brown boulder in the water near the lower right corner of the paper. The horizon is lined in the deep distance with pale gray mountains beneath the sweeping sky.
Léon-François-Antoine Fleury, On the Bay of Naples, c. 1830, oil on paper, Gift of Frank Anderson Trapp, 2004.166.15

On the Bay of Naples

Léon-François-Antoine Fleury · c. 1830 · oil on paper ·  Accession ID  2004.166.15

The ruins of a crenellated, round, stone tower sitting on gently sloping hills are silhouetted against a pale peach-colored sky in this horizontal landscape painting. Two deep green cypress trees lean against the mottled golden brown and rust-colored walls of the tower. To our left of the tower and slightly overlapping it, a high, charcoal-gray wall is also crenelated and in ruins. The land drops gently to the lower right corner. The low grasses in the field are straw and mustard yellow, with occasional patches of moss green. A person, loosely painted, stands on a low rise facing away from us, holding a tall staff, close to the tower. Several touches of tawny brown beyond suggest sheep grazing in the meadow. Silver, rose-pink, and cream-white clouds sweep across the sky high above the ruins. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes, especially in the hills and tower.
Léon-François-Antoine Fleury, The Tomb of Caecilia Metella, c. 1830, oil on canvas, Gift of Frank Anderson Trapp, 2004.166.16

The Tomb of Caecilia Metella

Léon-François-Antoine Fleury · c. 1830 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  2004.166.16