Lot 270
EDWARD SEAGO R.B.A., A.R.W.S., R.W.S. (BRITISH 1910–1974) §
EVENING IN THE PLACE DE LA CONCORDE, PARIS
Auction: 30 October from 10:00 GMT
Description
signed (lower left), titled (to reverse), oil on board
Dimensions
44cm x 59cm (17 ¼in x 23 ¼in)
Provenance
Phillips, London, Modern British and Irish Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, 2 June 1992, lot 113;
The estate of the late Lady Connie Middleton, sold to benefit the Royal College of Music.
Footnote
Edward Seago (1910–1974) was a leading figure in twentieth-century British landscape painting, working in both oil and watercolour to capture coastal and urban scenes, as well as landscapes encountered throughout his extensive travels. Largely self-taught, his distinctive style combined the immediacy of late Impressionism with a keen observational eye, resulting in compositions that remain firmly rooted in the reality of the places he saw. Particularly sensitive to subtle shifts in colour, light and weather, Seago could evoke an atmosphere with remarkably fluid and spontaneous brushwork.
Paris became an important subject for Seago during the 1950s and 1960s. Between 1951 and 1967 he made eight major painting expeditions to France, frequently travelling aboard his yacht and floating studio, Capricorn. Sailing across the Channel and along the Seine, he would stop at Dieppe, Honfleur and Rouen before reaching Paris, seeking for what he recounted as 'an endless search for explanations and discovery'. There, the Champs-Élysées, Tuileries Gardens and Place de la Concorde became recurring subjects, providing Seago with the compelling combination of grand architecture, bustling city life and ever-changing light that so fascinated him.
Evening in the Place de la Concorde, Paris is a particularly lively expression of this fascination. Rather than concentrating on the monumental architecture of the square, Seago lowers the horizon and devotes much of the composition to an expansive evening sky. Broad, loosely worked passages of cream, grey and pale blue capture the luminous and transient quality of clouds as they drift. Against this soft modulation, the buildings which boarder the square are rendered in silhouette with remarkable simplicity, their increasingly indistinct forms creating an almost abstract sense of aerial perspective.
The characteristic bustle of the Place de la Concorde has not been overlooked. Cars and clusters of figures animate the lower edge of the panel; their forms conveyed through deft dabs of paint. Seago’s expressive brushwork lends the foreground an almost flickering quality, capturing the constant movement and vivacity of the city he so adored.
