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Rocks at Port-Coton, The Lion Rock, Belle-Ile, 1886
Oil on canvas
Monet first visited the so-called ‘wild coast’ of Brittany in the autumn of 1886.
From the outset, he felt the primeval quality of the landscape, telling a friend that it gave the impression of ‘the world’s dawn, time abandoned ... the torment of planetary dramas.’
In this painting, he attempts to convey the ‘sinister, tragic’ quality of the hard volcanic rock, emphasising its massive, jagged formations through the use of thick impasto. In contrast to the soft white of the cliffs at Étretat, painted less than a year earlier, the colours here are earthy and rich, like seams of minerals, deep-hewn in the rocks.
Interestingly, Monet’s visit to this part of Brittany coincided with the publication of a detailed account of the region, by the geologist and palaeontologist, Charles Barrois, issued in a series of volumes throughout the 1880s.
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
