'In 1946, when he visited Paris for the first time after the war, Chagall did some small sketches in particularly radiant gouache or with white chalks on dark paper. They convey the impression of his renewed contact with the city, the enthusiasm and gratitude he felt at the time...In February, 1952, Chagall planned to paint a series of large pictures after the Paris sketches of 1946. He worked on them for two years and twenty-nine of them were hung in the exhibition dedicated to the series in the Galerie Maeght in June 1954. Some were subsequently worked over. The quantity of sketches and small versions of these pictures is amazing. It has long been Chagall's custom to make a general sketch of a work at every stage of its development. These sketches are made in the presence of the picture itself and serve as a guide to certain aspects of the color composition' (F. Meyer, Marc Chagall, Life and Work, London, 1964, pp. 529-30).

The present gouache is related closely to the large picture, La Nuit, from this 1952-3 series (Meyer p. 535). The central form of the figure and the cock are virtually identical although the landscape of Paris underneath is altered. The subject derives from a pastel on black paper of 1946 (W. Haftmann, Marc Chagall, New York, 1972, p. 132). It was then used as the left section of a lithograph of 1952 used in Verve (Vision de Paris, Maeght 81). Of La Nuit Susan Compton writes, 'This unusual picture on a black ground, with forms drawn with white outlines sometimes filled in with brilliant colours...the lovers are shown above the River Seine with landmarks like the Eiffel Tower below them. Paris has established her place as his second home, and the houses of Vitebsk have been put aside...In this dream world the images succeed each other in an unreal space which has an imaginary quality, defying close interpretation' (Chagall, London, 1985, p. 225).

In a letter of 29 May 1986, Ida Chagall confirms that this work "is a gouache by my father, Marc Chagall, 'La Ferme rouge', 1953, 59 x 60cm."