Art Institute of Chicago

Final Study for "Bathers at Asnières"

Georges Seurat (French, 1859-1891)

Date

1883

Medium

Oil on panel

Culture

France

Department

Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

Georges Seurat made this painting as a preparatory work for his monumental Bathers at Asnières , now in the National Gallery, London. It shows men and boys on the bank of the Seine River in the working-class Parisian suburb of Asnières. The view presented here is just across the river from the leisure park Seurat immortalized in his best-known work, A Sunday on La Grande Jatte—1884 . The frozen gestures and sedate poses of these bathers set a mood distinct from the sparkling scenes of Parisians enjoying restaurants and other riverbank activities favored by the Impressionists. Nevertheless, Seurat’s focus on a subject from modern life, his luminous palette, and his airy brushwork show how the young artist adapted characteristics of Impressionist painting for his own purposes.

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