Brief Report on Technology and Condition

Brief Report on Technology and Condition

Henri Edmond Cross (1856-1910)

Landscape in Provence (Paysage provençal)

1898

signed and dated bottom left: “henri Edmond Cross 98”

Oil on canvas

h 60.3 cm x b 81.2 cm

WRM Dep. FC 695

Brief Report

Caroline von Saint-George: Henri Edmond Cross – Landscape in Provence, Brief Report on Technology and ConditionResearch Project Painting Techniques of Impressionism and Postimpressionism, Online-Edition www.museenkoeln.de/impressionismus, Köln 2008 2

Henri Edmond Cross – Landscape in ProvenceBrief Report on Technology and Condition

The Landscape in Provence is one in a series of Pointil-list landscapes painted by Cross in southern France [Compin 1964, no. 65, p. 156]. For a picture support he chose a canvas sold by the Parisian colour mer-chant Paul Foinet in the standard P 25 size with a pale pink ground, whose colour seems to match the nuances described in contemporary commercial trade catalogues as rosé or rosé gris [Callen 2000, p. 66] (fig. 6). But while Cross retained this ground for his 1896 painting Sunset (WRM Dep. FC 708), here he decided against it and re-primed the entire canvas with white paint applied with a brush (fig. 6). One particularly striking feature of the painting’s crea-tion can be discerned on the left-hand edge, where the otherwise closely juxtaposed brush-strokes reveal sizable areas of the white ground (fig. 7): here, pale-blue paint has been applied in all directions without any direct connexion with the motif that we see today.

Closer inspection reveals that all these areas have been scratched with a sharp instrument and abrad-ed, presumably a deliberate act by the artist him-self in an effort to get rid of some existing painting (fig. 8). What followed, in any case, was a sketch-like underdrawing in charcoal, which marks all the essential outlines of the present painting (fig. 10). In line with the Divisionist theory of Neoimpres-sionism, Cross filled the whole area of the picture with a multitude of brush-dabs of similar size but of many different colours, although it appears that the sailing-boat along with the figures and flower-ing shrubs in the bottom right-hand corner were not originally planned. It was only during the paint-ing process that Cross added the outline of the boat in blue paint and that of the couple and the grasses in graphite or lead pencil, thus completing the com-position (figs. 11, 12).



Picture support canvas

Standard format P 25 (81.0 x 60.0 cm), horizontal

Weave tabby weave

Canvas characteristics vertical 26, horizontal 21 threads per cm; fine, regular and close weave; the vertical threads are in general almost twice as thick as the hori-zontal ones

Stretching apparently original, however the whole circumference is covered with brown adhesive paper; nail intervals vary from app. 3.0-8.5 cm

Stretcher/strainer stretcher with vertical centre-bar

Stretcher/strainer depth 2.3 cm

Traces left by manufacture/processing –

Manufacturer’s/dealer’s marks stencilled inscription verso on the left-hand half: “54 RUE N.D. DES CHAMPS PARIS / PAUL FOINET / (VAN EYCK) / TOILES & COULEURS FINES”, h 16.5 x b 23.8 cm (fig. 2)



Ground

Sizing none present

Colour two layers: pale pink; white (fig. 6)

Application 1) pale pink: applied before cutting-to-size and stretching, commer-cial pre-priming; one to at most two layers; smooth, even application; canvas structure remains visible; on the left-hand foldover edge the unprimed edge of the industrially pre-primed length of canvas is still present, characterized by conspicuous stretchmarks; 2) white: ground applied after cutting to size and stretching, extends no further than the edge of the picture; uneven application in all directions, brushwork clearly visible; one thin layer, semi-transpa-rent, so that the underlying pink ground is visible on the high points of the weave; the white ground was presumably applied by the artist himself either because he decided he would prefer that, or maybe in order to cover an underdrawing he wished to abandon

Binding medium presumably oil

Texture 1) pale pink: microscopically homogeneous layer with white oval pig-ment inclusions (lead white?) and individual black and fine red par-ticles; 2) white: microscopically pure white with just a very few fine black particles; the material is more reminiscent of oil-paint than ordinary priming



Composition planning/Underpainting/Underdrawing

Medium/technique two stages of picture planning:1) black charcoal drawing, diffuse in the IR reflectogram; the stereo-microscope however reveals clear remains of charcoal particles all over the picture (fig. 10);2) dark-grey graphite or lead-pencil drawing over the first paint appli-cations, serving to revise and extend the composition by the addition of the figures and flowering shrubs in the bottom right-hand corner (figs. 11, 12)

Extent/character 1) charcoal for a sketchy lay-in of the total composition on the ground; soft, thick stick of charcoal; line width varies from app. 0.2 to 0.5 cm; in some places applied over larger areas; group of figures and sailing boat seem to have been absent from this stage of the composition; 2) thin and very hard pencil lines, added only during the painting process, outline the silhouette of the seated woman, the recumbent man, as well as constituting a detailed drawing of the flowers and grass in the bottom right-hand corner; very thin, differentiated lines of constant breadth (app. 0.1 cm); points where the pencil made con-tact with, and was removed from, the canvas are clearly recogniz-able

Pentimenti on the left-hand edge of the picture the open painting technique reveals applications of pale-blue paint on the white ground which were rubbed or scratched off again at an early stage, and thus appar-ently rejected (figs. 7, 8)



Surface finish

Authenticity/Condition varnished, presumably not authentic [cf. Cross, WRM Dep. FC 708]

Paint layer

Paint application/technique and artist’s own revision Pointillist painting technique largely wet on dry, occasionally wet

on wet; the depiction consists of numerous short dashes of paint of mostly similar size, predominantly diagonal or horizontal; the dabs of colour are closely juxtaposed and often clearly overlap, so that the white ground is only occasionally visible (e.g. in the sky); the sailing boat and the yellow cylindrical shape on the left-hand edge of the picture were added later in the painting process, both with blue out-lines (figs. 7, 9); also added later were the couple and the flowering shrubs in the bottom right-hand corner (see above, figs. 11,12); the paints were mixed evenly and homogeneously on the palette, only very occasionally do two shades mix in a single brush-stroke

Painting tools brushes, presumably with bristles

Surface structure brushwork visible throughout, all in all slightly impasto (fig. 3)

Palette visual microscopic inspection reveals: white, pale yellow, medium yellow, orange, medium red, pale red lake (pale magenta fluores-cence in UV, fig. 4), dark red lake, violet, pale transparent blue (only for signature), medium blue, dark blue, medium green, dark green, black; generally numerous shades were obtained by blending and by addition of white; VIS spectrometry: chrome yellow(?), cadmium yellow, vermilion, rose madder(?), cobalt violet, viridian, ultramarine, cobalt blue

Binding mediums presumably oil



Additional remarks

–

Frame

Authenticity not original

State of preservation

Brown points due to oxidation on the canvas verso; individual dabs of paint, primarily yellow, blue and green, evince a fine internal craquelure with, in some cases, minimal flaking and lifting; early shrinkage craquelure in the green area in the bottom right-hand corner; individual irregularities in the colour satura-tion of the blue paint applications [cf. Cross, WRM Dep. FC 708].

Signature/Mark

When? “henri Edmond Cross 98”, signature on dry paint layer, pointed brush and medium semi-transparent blue, not present in the rest of the picture, hence presumably added later (fig. 5)

Autograph signature very probable; craquelure due to aging matches that in the picture it-self; the handwriting of the signature is typical of Cross and is found particularly often in the years 1896–99 [Compin 1964, p. 84]

Serial –



Source of illustrations

All illustrations and figures Wallraf-Richartz-Museum & Fondation Corboud

Examination methods used

3 Incident light 3 VIS spectrometry3 Raking light – Wood identification 3 Reflected light – FTIR (Fourier transform spectroscopy)3 Transmitted light – EDX (Energy Dispersive X-ray analysis)3 Ultraviolet fluorescence – Microchemical analysis3 Infrared reflectography– False-colour infrared reflectography – X-ray3 Stereomicroscopy

Author of examination: Caroline von Saint-George Date: 02/2007Author of brief report: Caroline von Saint-George Date: 03/2008

Literature

Budde/Schaefer 2001: Rainer Budde, Barbara Schaefer, Miracle de la couleur (Ausst.kat. Köln Wallraf-•Richartz-Museum & Fondation Corboud, 8. September - 9. Dezember 2001), Köln 2001, Kat. Nr. 26, S. 74, m. Abb.

Compin 1964: Isabelle Compin, E. H. Cross, Paris 1964 •

Callen 2000: Anthea Callen, The Art of Impressionism, Painting techniques and the making of moder-•nity, New Haven/London 2000



Fig. 1Recto

Fig. 2Verso



Fig. 3Raking light

Fig. 4UV-fluorescence photograph



Fig. 5Detail, signature

Fig. 6Detail, top edge of picture, two layers of pale pink ground (commercially pre-primed), with white layer above (presumably applied by the artist)



Fig. 7Detail, left-hand edge of picture, red arrows mark areas where ground is visible with preliminary applications of pale-blue paint later rejected by the artist

Fig. 8Detail from fig. 7, the first lay-in in blue paint was apparently deliberately rubbed and scratched away, microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)



Fig. 9Detail, sailing boat added at a late stage, its outlines first being drawn in blue paint on the existing paint layer

Fig. 10Traces of an under-drawing in black charcoal, microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)



Fig. 11Detail bottom right-hand corner in incident light (top) and in the IR reflectogram with clearly visible pencil underdrawing (bottom)

Fig. 12Detail of fig. 11, hair of the woman, her outlines were only added in pencil after the underlying paint layer had dried, microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)

Brief Report on Technology and Condition

Documents

Transcript of Brief Report on Technology and Condition