Pierre Bonnard
Boats in the Evening, Cannes1924

On view:

Geffen Galleries, The A. Jerrold Perenchio Collection of Impressionist and Modern Art

Oil painting of two moored fishing boats with crimson hulls and turquoise trim in a harbor, loose Post-Impressionist brushwork, signed 'Bonnard'

Artist or Maker: Pierre Bonnard
France, Fontenay-aux-Roses, 1867-1947
Title: Boats in the Evening, Cannes
Culture: French
Date Made: 1924
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: Canvas: 24 × 23 5/8 in. (60.96 × 60 cm) Frame: 29 1/4 × 29 1/2 × 2 3/8 in. (74.3 × 74.93 × 6.03 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of A. Jerrold Perenchio
Accession Number: M.2025.64.7
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: European Painting and Sculpture
Curatorial Notes: While images of boats and the sea pepper Bonnard’s sketchbooks and paintings, they are exceptions in an oeuvre largely focused on domestic interiors. Boats in the Evening, Cannes is one such work, painted before the artist permanently moved from Paris to the south of France in 1926. In its simplicity, it serves as a vehicle for the quotidian observations captured in his daily journal. Outlines of his graphite sketch are still visible through the paint. The rigid lines of the masts, the nearly indistinguishable shapes of the boats, and the tilted perspective, which recalls the Japanese prints that Bonnard and his colleagues so admired, announce the flatness that he explored throughout his career. The almost square canvas would have been custom-made for this image.

Bonnard loathed the fixed dimensions of a canvas. Instead, he pinned his ground to the wall so that “I can modify it as I wish. . . . This method is particularly suitable for landscapes [where] certain areas of the composition have to be allotted to land and sky, to foliage and water, and one can’t always decide on the proportions between these elements when one begins work.” The cropping of the picture and the distinct horizontal and vertical lines, emphasized by his use of blue, contrast markedly with the subtle gradations of color in sea and sky. The transformation of magentas and golds into cerulean and peach is a testament to the artist’s keen observational skills.

2024
Selected Bibliography: Lehmbeck, Leah, ed. Impressionist and Modern Art: The A. Jerrold Perenchio Collection. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Munich: DelMonico Books/Prestel, 2016.
Copyright: © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris, photo © Fredrik Nilsen

Pierre Bonnard
Boats in the Evening, Cannes1924

On view:

Geffen Galleries, The A. Jerrold Perenchio Collection of Impressionist and Modern Art

Artist or Maker: Pierre Bonnard
France, Fontenay-aux-Roses, 1867-1947
Title: Boats in the Evening, Cannes
Culture: French
Date Made: 1924
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: Canvas: 24 × 23 5/8 in. (60.96 × 60 cm) Frame: 29 1/4 × 29 1/2 × 2 3/8 in. (74.3 × 74.93 × 6.03 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of A. Jerrold Perenchio
Accession Number: M.2025.64.7
Classification: Paintings
Collecting Area: European Painting and Sculpture
Curatorial Notes: While images of boats and the sea pepper Bonnard’s sketchbooks and paintings, they are exceptions in an oeuvre largely focused on domestic interiors. Boats in the Evening, Cannes is one such work, painted before the artist permanently moved from Paris to the south of France in 1926. In its simplicity, it serves as a vehicle for the quotidian observations captured in his daily journal. Outlines of his graphite sketch are still visible through the paint. The rigid lines of the masts, the nearly indistinguishable shapes of the boats, and the tilted perspective, which recalls the Japanese prints that Bonnard and his colleagues so admired, announce the flatness that he explored throughout his career. The almost square canvas would have been custom-made for this image.

Bonnard loathed the fixed dimensions of a canvas. Instead, he pinned his ground to the wall so that “I can modify it as I wish. . . . This method is particularly suitable for landscapes [where] certain areas of the composition have to be allotted to land and sky, to foliage and water, and one can’t always decide on the proportions between these elements when one begins work.” The cropping of the picture and the distinct horizontal and vertical lines, emphasized by his use of blue, contrast markedly with the subtle gradations of color in sea and sky. The transformation of magentas and golds into cerulean and peach is a testament to the artist’s keen observational skills.

2024
Selected Bibliography: Lehmbeck, Leah, ed. Impressionist and Modern Art: The A. Jerrold Perenchio Collection. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Munich: DelMonico Books/Prestel, 2016.