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Lot Essay
During the first fifteen years of his career as a painter, Sisley lived and worked in a succession of towns west of Paris in the lush valley of the Seine, including Bougival, Louveciennes, Marly, and Sèvres. In 1880, a time of dire financial straits for many of the Impressionists, Sisley left the Paris suburbs for the more rural region near the confluence of the Seine and Loing, about seventy-five kilometers southeast of the capital. He settled at the village of Moret on the left bank of the Loing, where he would remain until his death nearly two decades later. In an autobiographical letter to the critic Adolphe Tavernier dated 1892, Sisley described the importance of his new surroundings for the evolution of his art: "It is at Moret--in this thickly wooded countryside with its tall poplars, the waters of the river Loing here, so beautiful, so translucent, so changeable; at Moret my art has undoubtedly developed most. I will never really leave this little place that is so picturesque" (quoted in R. Shone, Sisley, New York, 1992, p. 123).
For the first two years he spent at Moret, Sisley focused his artistic investigations on the river and the quays at the neighboring town of Saint-Mammès. In 1882, the year that the present canvas was painted, he shifted his attention to the Canal du Loing, creating a considerable body of work exploring the riverscape between the mouth of the canal and the viaduct carrying the railway line from Saint-Mammès to Moret. In most of these paintings, including the present one, he paid particular attention to the cluster of small, red-roofed houses that lay beside the locks. These houses also provided the subject for the only etchings that Sisley ever made: a group of four images exhibited in 1890 under the group title Le Loing à Moret. Commenting on Sisley's persistent artistic attraction to this stretch of the Loing, Richard Shone writes,
"He seemed unable for long to resist painting works in which there was water to offer its reflections, and river-banks to provide constantly changing activities. He was indefatigable in his exploration of the Loing, wide and shallow as it passed under the old bridge at Moret, deepening and curving as, joined first by the Canal du Loing and, almost immediately afterwards, by the energetic stream of the Orvanne, it flowed towards Saint-Mammès and out into the Seine" (ibid., p. 144).
The first owner of the present painting was Catholina Lambert, one of the most fervent collectors of Impressionist painting in the United States during the 1890s. Born and raised in Yorkshire, England, Lambert had emigrated in 1851 to Paterson, New Jersey, where he established himself as a leading manufacturer of fine silks. He began purchasing art during frequent trips to Paris in the late 1850s, and within thirty years, had amassed a collection of hundreds of paintings, ranging in date from the Renaissance to the nineteenth century. His Impressionist holdings included at least eighteen works by Sisley and twenty-four by Monet, along with several each by Renoir and Pissarro. In 1891, Lambert built for himself a crenellated castle called "Belle Vista" on the crest of Garrett Mountain overlooking the Paterson mills, with an opulent, three-story gallery to house his art collection.
For the first two years he spent at Moret, Sisley focused his artistic investigations on the river and the quays at the neighboring town of Saint-Mammès. In 1882, the year that the present canvas was painted, he shifted his attention to the Canal du Loing, creating a considerable body of work exploring the riverscape between the mouth of the canal and the viaduct carrying the railway line from Saint-Mammès to Moret. In most of these paintings, including the present one, he paid particular attention to the cluster of small, red-roofed houses that lay beside the locks. These houses also provided the subject for the only etchings that Sisley ever made: a group of four images exhibited in 1890 under the group title Le Loing à Moret. Commenting on Sisley's persistent artistic attraction to this stretch of the Loing, Richard Shone writes,
"He seemed unable for long to resist painting works in which there was water to offer its reflections, and river-banks to provide constantly changing activities. He was indefatigable in his exploration of the Loing, wide and shallow as it passed under the old bridge at Moret, deepening and curving as, joined first by the Canal du Loing and, almost immediately afterwards, by the energetic stream of the Orvanne, it flowed towards Saint-Mammès and out into the Seine" (ibid., p. 144).
The first owner of the present painting was Catholina Lambert, one of the most fervent collectors of Impressionist painting in the United States during the 1890s. Born and raised in Yorkshire, England, Lambert had emigrated in 1851 to Paterson, New Jersey, where he established himself as a leading manufacturer of fine silks. He began purchasing art during frequent trips to Paris in the late 1850s, and within thirty years, had amassed a collection of hundreds of paintings, ranging in date from the Renaissance to the nineteenth century. His Impressionist holdings included at least eighteen works by Sisley and twenty-four by Monet, along with several each by Renoir and Pissarro. In 1891, Lambert built for himself a crenellated castle called "Belle Vista" on the crest of Garrett Mountain overlooking the Paterson mills, with an opulent, three-story gallery to house his art collection.