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The Inlet at Berck (Pas-de-Calais)
Eugène Louis Boudin (French, 1824–1898)
1882
Medium/Technique
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
54.6 x 75 cm (21 1/2 x 29 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
Bequest of Mrs. Stephen S. FitzGerald
Accession Number64.1905
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
In the years of the Barbizon painters’ triumph at the Paris Salon, Boudin began painting his intimately-observed views of the Normandy coastline. Working outdoors in all weather, he paid particular attention to scudding clouds and changing seas. His early paintings often depict the fashionable Parisian tourists who flocked to northern shores in the 1850s, but in this view of the beach at Berck, a fishing and resort town, he instead explored the strand itself, bordered by simple houses, scattered with fence posts and tufts of sea grass.
InscriptionsLower right: E Boudin / 16 juillet 80
Provenance1892, E. O'Doard, Paris; November 29, 1892, sold by O'Doard to Durand-Ruel, Paris; March 8, 1900, sold by Durand-Ruel to Adolphe-Eugène Tavernier (b. 1854? - d. after 1907), Paris [see note 1]. Possibly with J. Eastman Chase Gallery, Boston [see note 2]. By 1926, Desmond FitzGerald (b. 1846 - d. 1926), Brookline, MA; by descent to his daughter-in-law, Agnes Blake (Mrs. Stephen S.) FitzGerald (b. 1876), Weston, MA; 1964, bequest of Mrs. Stephen S. FitzGerald to the MFA. (Accession Date: October 14, 1964)
NOTES:
[1] This information is taken from Robert Schmit, "Eugene Boudin" (Paris, 1973), vol. 2, p. 140, cat. no. 1658.
[2] Notes in the MFA curatorial file record a label from Chase Gallery on the reverse of the frame. Chase was active as a dealer from about the 1870s until the 1920s.
NOTES:
[1] This information is taken from Robert Schmit, "Eugene Boudin" (Paris, 1973), vol. 2, p. 140, cat. no. 1658.
[2] Notes in the MFA curatorial file record a label from Chase Gallery on the reverse of the frame. Chase was active as a dealer from about the 1870s until the 1920s.