Past Exhibition

Eugene Boudin at the National Gallery of Art

About two dozen men and women sit in straight-backed, wooden chairs gathered along a sandy beach near low, gently breaking waves with sailboats floating in the ocean beyond in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is loosely painted throughout, making much of the detail indistinct. 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 right two-thirds of the composition. The women wear long dresses with full skirts, their shoulders wrapped in matching shawls in black, smoke gray, royal or arctic blue, rust red, or cream white. Some wear straw-colored hats with black or baby-blue bands, and others wear scarves over their hair. The men also wear hats, most of them black top hats, and suits in black or pecan brown. Some people hold up parasols in harvest gold, slate blue, teal, or gray. A few straight-backed, wooden chairs with rushed seats sit empty or are tipped over to our left of the group. Two children, one wearing marigold orange and the other topaz blue, and both wearing straw hats, kneel or squat and bend over the sand at the center of the group. Two dark brown or black dogs, one small and one large, stand to our right. Two tall, wooden poles rise high above the crowd near the right edge of the composition. A thin banner with blue, white, and red stripes flutters from the pole closer to us, and a red banner lifts in the breeze on the one farther away. Painted with thick, visible brushstrokes, low waves with white crests lap against the shore in bands of pale lilac purple, light turquoise, and aquamarine blue just beyond the crowd. Two people sit in a rowboat in the ocean to our left, and several sailboats with tan sails move into the distance to the horizon, which comes about a quarter of the way up the composition. Bright white strokes to our right could be sails in bright sunlight, deep in the distance. One boat amid the sailboats puffs a plume of gray smoke. Pale, almost translucent white clouds drift across the light blue sky above. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner: “E. Boudin 63.”
Eugène Boudin, Beach Scene at Trouville, 1863, oil on wood, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1983.1.14

Details

  • Dates

    -

  • Locations

    East Building, Mezzanine, Northwest
About two dozen men and women sit in straight-backed, wooden chairs gathered along a sandy beach near low, gently breaking waves with sailboats floating in the ocean beyond in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is loosely painted throughout, making much of the detail indistinct. 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 right two-thirds of the composition. The women wear long dresses with full skirts, their shoulders wrapped in matching shawls in black, smoke gray, royal or arctic blue, rust red, or cream white. Some wear straw-colored hats with black or baby-blue bands, and others wear scarves over their hair. The men also wear hats, most of them black top hats, and suits in black or pecan brown. Some people hold up parasols in harvest gold, slate blue, teal, or gray. A few straight-backed, wooden chairs with rushed seats sit empty or are tipped over to our left of the group. Two children, one wearing marigold orange and the other topaz blue, and both wearing straw hats, kneel or squat and bend over the sand at the center of the group. Two dark brown or black dogs, one small and one large, stand to our right. Two tall, wooden poles rise high above the crowd near the right edge of the composition. A thin banner with blue, white, and red stripes flutters from the pole closer to us, and a red banner lifts in the breeze on the one farther away. Painted with thick, visible brushstrokes, low waves with white crests lap against the shore in bands of pale lilac purple, light turquoise, and aquamarine blue just beyond the crowd. Two people sit in a rowboat in the ocean to our left, and several sailboats with tan sails move into the distance to the horizon, which comes about a quarter of the way up the composition. Bright white strokes to our right could be sails in bright sunlight, deep in the distance. One boat amid the sailboats puffs a plume of gray smoke. Pale, almost translucent white clouds drift across the light blue sky above. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner: “E. Boudin 63.”
Eugène Boudin, Beach Scene at Trouville, 1863, oil on wood, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1983.1.14

Overview: 22 paintings and 21 drawings and watercolors of beach scenes, ships, and seascapes by Eugène Boudin from the collection of the National Gallery of Art were on view in this exhibition, which honored the centenary of the birth of Gallery benefactor Paul Mellon. Included were 27 works given to the Gallery by Mellon and an additional 11 donated by his sister Ailsa Mellon Bruce. It was the first American exhibition in 30 years to focus on the works of Boudin.

Other programs celebrating the centenary of Paul Mellon's birth included a special installation, Paul Mellon and the National Gallery of Art, on view in the West Building, Main Floor, Information Room; Paul Mellon Collects, a series of Gallery talks on selected works of art that Paul Mellon and his wife Bunny gave the National Gallery of Art; In Honor of Paul Mellon: The Great Collectors, a series of Sunday lectures on major donors to the National Gallery; and a special series of mid-day piano concerts presented in the West Building Lecture Hall on six Wednesdays in May and June. A Benny Goodman–style jazz concert was presented by the Eddie Daniels Ensemble in the East Building atrium on Sunday June 10. Benny Goodman, one of Mellon's favorite musicians, had performed on May 30, 1978, at one of the events held at the museum on the occasion of the opening of the East Building. Paul Mellon: In His Own Words, a documentary film about the life of Paul Mellon, was produced by the National Gallery of Art and premiered in June 2007. The Choir of St. George's Chapel of Windsor Castle presented concerts in tribute to Paul Mellon on October 25 in the East Garden Court of the West Building and again on November 10 during the evensong service at St. George's Chapel.

Organization: The exhibition was organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington. The curator was Florence E. Coman, assistant curator of French paintings, National Gallery of Art.

Sponsor: The exhibition was supported by Altria Group, Inc. The special series of Wednesday piano concerts was supported by the Billy Rose Foundation.

Attendance: 116,400

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