Le Pont. Sur la Seine, Paris. The Bridge - on the Seine, Paris. by Pierre Bonnard, 1867-1947

Pierre Bonnard, 1867-1947
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Le Pont. Sur la Seine, Paris. The Bridge - on the Seine, Paris.

Original lithograph in four colours. 1899. Signed in pencil, and inscribed 'No 3'. From the edition of 100 impressions Edition possibly not completed). Issued in the series: 'Quelques Aspects de la Vie de Paris - Aspects of Parisian Life'. Drawn and printed at the studio of Auguste Clot, 1898. Issued by Ambroise Vollard 1899. Impression with variant colours - pale olive, beige, brown-beige, yellow.
Ref: R.Marx-Bonnard Lithographs 64. Bouvet-Bonnard L'Oeuvre Gravé no 66.
Note: An impression specially signed for the original buyer by Bonnard The signature and number at the bottom right sheet corner.

Very fine impression with fine soft variant colours. On pale cream light wove paper. Generally excellent condition; Fain test trace of old mounting. Full sheet:16x20 7/8ins. Image:
10 3/8insx15 7/8ins (265x403mm).

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This impression of Bonnard's 'Le Pont' is unusual in being signed in full in pencil, very few impressions in the edition were pencil signed. It was probably specially signed for the original owner as the signature is not at the foot of the image on the right but at the bottom right corner of the sheet. It is also numbered 3 in pencil.

'The Bridge' is one of the most purely atmospheric of Bonnard's great colour lithographs in the famous series 'Aspects of Parisian Life - Quelques Aspects de la Vie de Paris'. It is essentially a study of the misty light of a cold morning beside the river Seine, with patches of yellow sunlight just touching the foreground. The interaction of the colours, beige, olive and yellow ochre, is used not really to define the image but to evoke a visual atmosphere. This feeling is emphasised by the treatment of the figures, drawn with shapes that are not so much a description of form but rather an evocation of the visual sensation - the mother in her voluminous coat perhaps taking her child to school, the artist with his portfolio bent over against the wind, the drivers on the coaches on the bridge huddled over the reins of the horses.

By the mid 1890's Bonnard was totally absorbed by ideas derived from Gauguin's Synthétisme. Like the other Nabis painters he was using exaggerations and distortions of form to achieve emotional effects, together with colours designed to increase those effects rather than merely to describe in visual terms. His approach to composition had also been greatly influenced by his admiration for Japanese prints. These qualities are very apparent 'Le Pont', with its cut-off shapes, flattened treatment of perspective and é evocative colour.