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We look slightly down onto the surface of a river in which three narrow canoes, each paddled by a single person, are being rowed toward us in this horizontal landscape painting. The rowers wear white shirts rolled up to the elbows, light blue pants, and straw-yellow, wide-brimmed hats pulled down over the eyes. They sit in the bottom of their boats with legs extended and the handle of the double-bladed paddle straddling the boat over their laps. The canoe closest to us comes almost directly toward us, angled slightly to our right as it cuts through the surface of the river, its tip extending off the bottom edge of the canvas. The second canoe is a couple of boat lengths behind and to our left of the closest canoe. The third is small in the distance, near the horizon that comes three-quarters of the way up the composition. The back end of a fourth canoe and a single paddle extends into the scene from the right edge of the canvas. The butter-yellow paddles are reflected in the pale sage green and sky blue of the river’s surface. The river is lined on both sides with lush trees and vegetation, which fills the top quarter of the painting above the horizon.

Gustave Caillebotte

Skiffs, 1877

West Building, Ground Floor - Gallery 41

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 88.9 x 116.2 cm (35 x 45 3/4 in.)

framed: 118.7 x 146 x 11.4 cm (46 3/4 x 57 1/2 x 4 1/2 in.)

Credit Line

Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

Accession Number

1985.64.6

Artists / Makers

Gustave Caillebotte (artist) French, 1848 - 1894

Image Use

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Overview

Between 1877 and 1878, Gustave Caillebotte made a series of paintings focusing on swimmers, fishermen, rowers, and canoers at his family estate in Yerres. In Skiffs, which was exhibited at the fourth impressionist exhibition in 1879 under the name Pésissoires sur L’Yerres (Flat-Bottom Canoes on the Yerres), he adopted the short, broken brushstrokes of Monet and the bold palette of Renoir, but achieved a much different effect: as the rowers zig-zag across the canvas in a bold, diagonal rhythm, they convey a sense of movement, a progression of time and space that reveals Caillebotte’s interest in photography. An avid sailor and boat designer, Caillebotte—perhaps inspired by Japanese prints—adopted a dramatic viewpoint perched above the scene to emphasize the precariousness associated with the easily tipped, flat-bottomed skiffs.

Inscription

upper right: G. Caillebotte / 1877; signed probably by someone other than the artist in imitation of atelier stamp, lower left: G. Caillebotte

Provenance

The family of the artist, who died in 1894 without children; sold 1966 to (Wildenstein & Co., New York);[1] sold that same year to Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon; gift 1985 to the NGA.

[1] Acquisition date and source according to a letter from Wildenstein's dated 14 December 1998, in NGA curatorial records.

Associated Names

Mellon, Paul
Wildenstein & Co., Inc.

Exhibition History

1879: Le 4me Exposition de Peinture [Fourth Impressionist Exhibition], Paris, 1879, no. 10 as Périssoires.

1951: Rétrospective Gustave Caillebotte au profit du Musée de Rennes, Galerie Beaux-Arts, Paris, 1951, no. 18

1959: Contrasts in Landscape, Wildenstein, New York, 1959, no. 23.

1986: Gifts to the Nation: Selected Acquisitions from the Collections of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1986, unnumbered checklist

1986: The New Painting: Impressionism 1874-1886, National Gallery of Art, Washington; The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, 1986

1990: Französische Impressionisten und ihre Wegbereiter aus der National Gallery of Art, Washington und dem Cincinnati Art Museum, Neue Pinakothek, Munich, 1990, no. 39, repro.

1996: Gustave Caillebotte: The Unknown Impressionist, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1996, no. 10, repro., as Périssoires (Flat-Bottomed Canoes) on the Yerres.

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

1999: Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art; Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, 1999, no. 37, repro.

2005: Caillebotte: Au coeur de l'impressionisme, Fondation de l'Hermitage, Lausanne, 2005, no. 25, repro.

2008: Über das Wasser - Gustave Caillebotte, Kunsthalle Bremen; Ordrupgaard, Charlottenlund; Brooklyn Museum, 2008-2009, no. 27, repro.

2010: Impressionism on the Seine, Musée des impressionnismes Giverny, 2010, no. 28, repro.

2011: Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; The National Art Center, Tokyo; Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, 2011, no. 4, repro.

2013: Gustave Caillebotte: Impressionist in Modern Paris, Bridgestone Museum of Art, Tokyo, 2013, no. 35, repro.

2014: Caillebotte à Yerres, au temps de l'impressionnisme, Centre d'Art et d'Expositions La Ferme Ornée, Yerres, 2014.

2015: Gustave Caillebotte: The Painter's Eye, National Gallery of Art, Washington; Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, 2015-2016, no. 45, repro.

2016: Caillebotte, Peintre et Jardinier, Musée des impressionnismes Giverny; Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid, 2016, no. 34, repro.

Bibliography

1978: Berhaut, Marie. Caillebotte, sa vie et son oeuvre. Catalogue raisonne des peintures et pastels. Paris, 1978: no.95.

1990: Französische Impressionisten und ihre Wegbereiter aus der National Gallery of Art, Washington und dem Cincinnati Art Museum. Exh. cat. Neue Pinakothek, Munich, 1990: no. 39, repro.

1991: Coman, Florence E. Joie de Vivre: French Paintings from the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1991: no. 23, repro.

1991: Gingold, Diane J., and Elizabeth A.C. Weil. The Corporate Patron. New York, 1991: 28-29, 32, color repro. (as Sculls).

1998: Trieb, Bernhard, Francois Chevalier, and Francois Casalis. "Gustave Caillebotte, peintre, yachtsman, architecte naval." Le Chasse-Marée 116 (May 1998): 26-30, repro. 29.

2006: Brettell, Richard R., and Stephen F. Eisenman. Nineteenth-Century Art in the Norton Simon Museum. New Haven and London, 2006: 374 fig. 97a.

2012: Kennicott, Philip. "French Rooms Reopen, With Different Accents." Washington Post 135, no. 55 (January 29, 2012): E25.