Bathing Time at Deauville

1865

Eugène Boudin

Artist, French, 1824 - 1898

Eugène Boudin

Attributed to

About two dozen men and women sit in straight-backed, wooden chairs gathered along a sandy expanse around pockets of water under a slate-blue sky that fills the top two-thirds of this horizontal landscape painting. Most of the people sit with their backs to us but the faces we can see suggest they all have light skin. The people gather in a loose crowd that crosses the left two-thirds of the composition. The women wear dark hats and long dresses with full skirts, their shoulders wrapped in shawls in black, red, dark yellow, or cream white. The men also wear hats, most of them black bowler hats, and suits in black or pecan brown. A few women hold up blue parasols in harvest gold, slate blue, teal, or gray. Two women and a man sit on the sand to the right. Three changing huts stand behind the group across the left half, and two brown horses stand at the water’s edge nearby. Three poles march into the distance to the right near where more people gather across a pocket of water. The artist signed and dated the lower right corner, “E. Boudin – 65.”

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on wood

  • Credit Line

    Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

  • Dimensions

    overall: 34.7 x 57.5 cm (13 11/16 x 22 5/8 in.)
    framed: 58.4 x 81.6 x 12.7 cm (23 x 32 1/8 x 5 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1983.1.8

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(Cabruja sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, 20 May 1921, no. 5); purchased by Durand-Ruel.[1] (sale, Christie's, London, 23 April 1937, no. 102, as Property of a Lady); (Arthur Tooth & Sons, London);[2] sold January 1943 to Mrs. Peter Pleydell-Bouverie, London, until at least 1954.[3] N. Beecham.[4] (Marlborough-Gerson Gallery, New York); sold December 1963 to Mr. Paul Mellon, Upperville, VA; gift 1983 to NGA.
[1] Annotated sales catalogue in Knoelder library fiche (copy in NGA curatorial files).
[2] Annotated sales catalogue in Knoedler library fiche (copy in NGA curatorial files). Arthur Tooth records, accession no. 860679, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles: volume XXI, London branch stock inventory, p. 105.
[3] The Pleydell-Bouverie Collection of Impressionist and Other Paintings, exh. cat., Tate Gallery, London, 1954, no. 6.
[4] Beecham given as prior owner in A Selection of Important 19th Century French Masters, exh. cat., Marlborough Fine Art Ltd, London, October 1960, no. 3.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1937

  • La Flèche d'Or, Arthur Tooth and Sons, London, 1937, no. 2

1939

  • Summer Exhibition, Arthur Tooth & Sons, London, 1939, no. 32

1954

  • The Pleydell-Bouverie Collection of Impressionist and Other Paintings, The Tate Gallery, London, 1954, no. 6.

1960

  • A Selection of Important 19th Century French Masters, Marlborough Fine Art Ltd., London, 1960, no. 3.

1966

  • French Paintings from the Collections of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon and Mrs. Mellon Bruce, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1966, no. 14, repro.

1982

  • Manet and Modern Paris, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1982, no. 52, repro.

1989

  • Paintings by Eugène Boudin from the National Gallery of Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1989, no cat.

1992

  • Boudin at Trouville, The Burrell Collection, Glasgow Museum; Courtauld Institute Galleries, London, 1992-1993, no. 39, repro.

1999

  • Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art; Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, 1999, no. 12, repro.

  • Around Impressionism: French Paintings from the National Gallery of Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1999, no cat.

2007

  • Impressionists by the Sea, Royal Academy of Arts, London; The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, 2007-2008, no. 16, repro.

2009

  • The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting Along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874, University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor; Dallas Museum of Art, 2009-2010, no catalogue.

2013

  • Impressionists at the Waterside: Depicting Urban Resorts: Paris, the Seine, and Normandy, Tokyo Fuji Art Museum; Fukuoka City Museum; The Museum of Kyoto, 2013-2014, no. 84, repro.

Bibliography

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 63, repro.

Inscriptions

lower right: E. Boudin - 65

Wikidata ID

Q20188657

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