Lot Essay
Sisley settled in the small village of Saint-Mamms in the autumn of 1883. Close to the confluence of the rivers Seine and Loing, about twenty miles south-east of Paris, St-Mamms offered Sisley with a vast variety of subjects for his paintings. Between 1882 and 1885, the year of the present picture, he executed a number of works from different vantage points along the banks of the river Loing. Sisley's main concern in the series was to capture the landscape at different times of the day and during different seasons. The critic Gustave Geffroy wrote:
"He sought to express the harmonies that prevail, in all weathers and at every time of day, between foliage, water and sky, and he succeeded...He loved river banks; the fringes of woodland; towns and villages glimpsed through the trees; old buildings swamped in greenery; wintery morning sunlight; summer afternoons" (G. Geffroy, "Sisley," Les Cahiers d'Aujourd'hui, 1923).
"He sought to express the harmonies that prevail, in all weathers and at every time of day, between foliage, water and sky, and he succeeded...He loved river banks; the fringes of woodland; towns and villages glimpsed through the trees; old buildings swamped in greenery; wintery morning sunlight; summer afternoons" (G. Geffroy, "Sisley," Les Cahiers d'Aujourd'hui, 1923).