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Description: | Signed: yes Description: James Tissot's highly finished and realistic works combine great attention to detail with compositions rich in surface pattern that create a bold decorative effect. Both the narrative content of his paintings and the expressions of his subjects' faces caught in motion, lend his works an intriguing quality of ambiguity. The Last evening, painted in 1873, is an outstanding example of Tissot's work. Set on the Thames, the scene hinges on the un-elucidated narrative of a society woman. As the critic of the Art Journal noted, it is: "A full and well-painted composition [
] but it is impossible to obtain any clue of the story [
] The principal person is a young lady looking intently on the river through race or opera glasses; she stands on one of the temporary river landing quays, and behind her sit two well appointed officers of police or customs". Commenting on the technique of execution the critic of The Athenaeum wrote: §her dress has received as much attention as her face [
] this may be called a study in white, as many of Mr. Tissot's pictures are. Its defect is, that the flesh lacks solidity [
] In nature there could be no mistake as to the relative values of the girl's head and the sky behind it, but here the one is nearly as solid and rich as the other§. | Subjects: | London) everyday life; figure; place (Thames | Source: | Vads | Creator: | Artist: Tissot, James (French painter and printmaker, 1836-1902) Æ | Identifier: | http://www.vads.ac.uk/large.php?uid=8401... | Go to resource |
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