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The Drying Sails

Andre Derain • Painting, 1905, 82×101 cm
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About the artwork
This artwork was added since it is referred to in the materials below
Art form: Painting
Subject and objects: Landscape
Style of art: Fauvism
Technique: Oil
Materials: Canvas
Date of creation: 1905
Size: 82×101 cm
Artwork in selections: 37 selections
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Description of the artwork «The Drying Sails»

The Drying Sails was exhibited at the Autumn Salon of 1905 in Paris and became the standard of a new art movement called Fauvism. Derain and his associates were not prone to theorize, so none of them came up with the name of the movement. It was formed from the related styles of several painters, who had common creative aspirations. After seeing their paintings, the critic Louis Vauxcelles moved to the bronze child’s head by the sculptor Mark and exclaimed: “Donatello among wild animals!” That was the reason why the nickname "wilds" united those Montmartre workshops residents, who associated expression with “pure elements” of painting: line, shape and, primarily, color as it is.
Matisse invited Derain and Signac to work at the port town of Collioure, and Derain brought a series of seascapes therefrom. There is a stark comparison between the direct bright light of the Mediterranean coast and the dense interlacing shadows at the island of Chatou all covered with gardens! The light is so white and intense that all colored objects are seen faded, and the shadows are light, transparent, sometimes even tinted.
In times past, the painters worked in their workshops near the north window to get soft light, not changing much throughout the day. Having come to the open air, they were able to appreciate the gifts generously offered to the colorists by early morning, fog or water ripples... But not the noon with its sharp shadows stealing color from all the colored objects. And it’s a sure thing, that the noon at the seashore is even worse, because it doubles the dazzling subtropical light.
But the bold artist sees the primal matter in this light pervading the whole space. It seems to produce all the objects: mountains, sand, walls, people, boats, the sea. Such an original matter in Derain’s paintings from Collioure is the blank space of the primed canvas untouched with brush. But color does not just work as color, it is also the means to convey shadows.
Therefore, Derain applied his color swabs, then put dots, then whole lines and contour strokes, then large spots, freely inserting green into the thick of orange, red between different blue spots. The space in the primordial light and color is flexible and resilient in the flat picture; it is just about to spring and break the frame.
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