City at Twilight

Camille Fontaine · 1898

Medium

Oil on canvas

Dimensions

88 × 72 cm

Fontaine captures Paris in that particular suspended moment between day and night when gaslights flicker to life and the city takes on a different character. The Boulevard Haussmann stretches into the distance, its perspective drawing the eye deep into the canvas while the foreground figures — pedestrians, a carriage, a flower seller — occupy the immediate space with casual elegance. The blue-violet of the sky at this specific hour is one of the most difficult effects to achieve in oil paint, and Fontaine's mastery of it is extraordinary.