.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Filled with bold colours and a great sense of light, Le Port d'Anvers dates from one of the most important moments in Friesz' artistic career. For it was during his journey with Braque in 1906 to Antwerp, his second to that city, that his Fauve style truly coalesced. Friesz had been surrounded by Fauve artists and Fauve influences for only a matter of months by the time that Le Port d'Anvers was painted. Now, electric fields and lines of swirling colour have been used to a highly expressive effect. This is a painterly Fauvism that shows Friesz' interest in a style and manner that is akin to the pictures of Matisse and, at this pre-Cubist period, Braque. For there is a great deal of modelling and modulation, and yet the picture bursts with light and colour and energy.
Friesz' 'conversion' had begun at the 1905 Salon d'Automne, when the word 'Fauve' was coined by the (disparaging) critic Louis Vauxcelles. Ironically, Vauxcelles gave great praise to the paintings that Friesz exhibited there, but this encouragement was to be ignored, because Friesz was blown away by the room in which the Fauves had their pictures exhibited, and following this revelation became increasingly involved in their circle. Indeed, he spent a great amount of time with Matisse in particular and had a studio in the same building as him. Le Port d'Anvers was therefore painted at the very highpoint and at the heart of the brief but highly influential Fauve period.
Several paintings from this important second visit to Antwerp clearly took the same vantage point as Le Port d'Anvers, showing the same terrace in the foreground, the same buildings in the background. However, Le Port d'Anvers is notable for the amount of activity that is shown on the water. On the one hand, this gives the work a sense of the bustle of a busy harbour; and on the other, it provides him with an excellent pretext to fill the work with more colour, more reflections and more darting verticals in the form of the numerous masts.
Friesz' 'conversion' had begun at the 1905 Salon d'Automne, when the word 'Fauve' was coined by the (disparaging) critic Louis Vauxcelles. Ironically, Vauxcelles gave great praise to the paintings that Friesz exhibited there, but this encouragement was to be ignored, because Friesz was blown away by the room in which the Fauves had their pictures exhibited, and following this revelation became increasingly involved in their circle. Indeed, he spent a great amount of time with Matisse in particular and had a studio in the same building as him. Le Port d'Anvers was therefore painted at the very highpoint and at the heart of the brief but highly influential Fauve period.
Several paintings from this important second visit to Antwerp clearly took the same vantage point as Le Port d'Anvers, showing the same terrace in the foreground, the same buildings in the background. However, Le Port d'Anvers is notable for the amount of activity that is shown on the water. On the one hand, this gives the work a sense of the bustle of a busy harbour; and on the other, it provides him with an excellent pretext to fill the work with more colour, more reflections and more darting verticals in the form of the numerous masts.