Paul Signac

This watercolor study was purchased by Mrs. Eliza Radeke directly from the Armory Show in New York in 1913. The Armory exhibition was instrumental in spreading an appreciation for French art and Modernism to the United States. Paul Signac was a Pointillist. He followed the rules of contemporary color theory by separating colors into individual dots or strokes of pigment that blended when seen from a distance. Because Pointillist technique required slow execution in the studio, Signac created thousands of watercolor sketches outdoors to guide him when indoors. While visiting Venice in 1904, he made some two hundred sketches, including this one, which depicts a colorful canal scene with St. Mark’s Basilica in the distance. He wrote his observations about color and light to inform his studio work, including “gris perle” (“pearl grey,” a mottled bluish-gray) in the sky, and “reflet ochre” (“ochre reflection”) in the canal.