Le Quai Saint-Michel et Notre-Dame

Painted in 1901, this canvas belongs to a group of around ten works in which Maximilien Luce depicted the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris seen from the Quai Saint-Michel. It marks one of his last uses of the Neo-Impressionist technique of divisionism — separate dabs of colour — and forms a link between his purely Neo-Impressionist period and his later Populist phase. At the centre, the cathedral rises radiant in warm oranges, pinks and reds, with bluish shadows built from fine juxtaposed brushstrokes, while the embankment and bridge, plunged into shadow, are rendered in broader strokes of sky blue, turquoise and purplish pink. Luce fills the quayside with everyday Parisian life: well-dressed bourgeois, servants carrying produce, a grandmother leading a child, a baker's boy with a basket on his head, the stalls of the bouquinistes, an omnibus and a handcart. Above this busy, ephemeral human activity, the cathedral stands as a symbol of eternity. The anecdotal, people-filled character of the series contrasts sharply with Monet's Rouen Cathedral paintings of 1892–1893, and reflects above all the influence of Luce's friend Camille Pissarro and his late plunging views over Paris.