The Luxembourg Gardens, Paris, Alice Maude Fanner; oil on canvas, 25 x 32 in. ( 64 x 81 cm). Image is from a Christie’s autcion in 2013; I assume the painting is currently in a private collection.
British painter Alice Fanner, who was active in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, was noted for her landscapes, coastal scenes and cityscapes.
In this painting of the Luxembourg Gardens, she gives us an inviting view down the colonnade of trees along the green of the garden lawn, highlighted by a fountain in dappled shade and the sculptures that adorn it.
I love the turtles in the water, the way the fall colors of the trees splash into the fountain along with the blue of the sky and the lacework of tree shadows on the edge of the fountain. The view pulls us back into the distance so rapidly that we almost don’t notice the people out for a stroll under the trees at right.
The entire painting is wonderfully loose and painterly while retaining an academic rigor in its accurate perspective.
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