Are we exhibiting an unfinished canvas? This landscape offers a panoramic view over the Pierrefonds valley, in the Oise region. On the horizon you can see the Compiègne wood. The luminous ruins of the medieval castle dominate the composition. Corot set his easel to the side of the path to paint the landscape. The free course of painting was reproached him. The work gives the effect of a study and not of a completed work. The first floor is a solid construction and ignores the line. The earth, the grass and the figure are quickly wiped out. The second floors are more detailed: trees, fields, architecture, clouds. But everything is based on a modern use of color, with a narrow palette, at the expense of detail. Corot was one of the first to study outdoors, which is surprising for the time.
"Pleinairism" refers to the act of working outside the studio. This was made possible by the industrial invention in 1841 of colored metal hoses which avoided the need to grind and mix pigments. Very often the artist creates drawings or gouaches on site to fix motifs and lights which he then uses in the paintings in the studio.
© Musée des beaux-arts de Quimper.
Title: View of Pierrefonds Castle
Author: Jean Baptiste Camille Corot
Date: About 1840-1845
Technique: Oil painting on canvas
Displayed in: Quimper Museum of Fine Arts
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