Coast, Brittany by James Wilson Morrice

Provenance:
Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal
Private Collection, Ontario

Literature:
Katerina Atanassova, “Morrice: The A.K. Prakash Collection in Trust to the Nation”, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 2017, page 82
Charles C. Hill, “Morrice A Gift to the Nation: The G. Blair Laing Collection”, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 1992, page 121

By the beginning of the twentieth century James Wilson Morrice was a recognized and well-known painter. One of his paintings, “Quai des Grands Augustins, Paris” (Musée d’Orsay), was purchased by the French government, while “Fête foraine, Montmartre” was acquired by a Russian collector, Ivan Morozov, at the Salon of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts in 1904. In the summer of 1906, Morrice spent his time in Dieppe, France and in Le Pouldu and Concarneau in Brittany. While in Le Pouldu, Morrice was in the company of artists, including Gabriel Thompson of England, Robert Henry Logan of America and Mela Muter of Poland. Morrice was to return to the Breton coast again from 1909-1910, where he spent the winter season in a studio in Concarneau – a most productive stay for the artist. Le Pouldu and Concarneau were popular painting sites, Paul Gauguin having produced work in Le Pouldu in 1889 and 1890. Perhaps the admiration that Morrice held for Gauguin initially attracted him to the area. According to Charles C. Hill, “Gauguin had painted the village itself and the surrounding landscape, but what Morrice liked most about Le Pouldu was its ‘fine coast & small beach’.”

“Coast, Brittany”, likely executed between 1906-1910 by Morrice, on one of his sojourns on the Breton coast, is an atmospheric rendering executed with raw luminosity and colouration. Morrice produced various oil sketches of beach landscapes and seascapes, with a keen focus on the cliffs rising in the background and figures dotted along the beach. “Coast, Brittany”, in contrast, is an intimate, diminutive composition. The clouds and the sea are agitated and tinged with strokes of grey and black. The rugged nature of the scene, punctuated by the sweeping curve of the foreground, the dominant cliff at the left and the vastness of the sea, evokes the drama of an impending storm and the solace of the vantage point. Morrice held great affection for seascapes and beach landscapes, executing many works on his trips along the Breton and Norman coasts. As Anne-Marie Bouchard notes, “Morrice fits historically within the wake of Impressionists and Post-Impressionists such as Pierre-Auguste Renoir and, Gustave Caillebotte, Pissarro and Signac, who were obviously partial to seascapes.”

We extend our thanks to Lucie Dorais, Canadian art historian and author of “J.W. Morrice” (National Gallery of Canada, 1985) for her assistance in researching this artwork.