Raymond Simonin (1907–1998) — Sardine Boats At The Quay, Saint-gilles-croix-de-vie, Vendée

A fine oil on canvas by Raymond Simonin (1907-1998), signed lower right and inscribed "✝ de Vie", i.e. Croix-de-Vie (now Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie, Vendée, on the French Atlantic coast).

The artist captures the harbour on the ebbing tide: a flotilla of sardine boats moored alongside the quay, their red, green and blue hulls answering one another in the mirror of the water, masts rising into a broad clouded sky. In the foreground an orange dinghy lies grounded on the mud; to the left, the low houses of the village are enlivened by a few figures; beyond, the channel winds away towards the dunes and salt meadows. The handling is broad and richly loaded, applied frankly with brush and knife, carrying the pale silvered light particular to the Atlantic seaboard.

Frame: 85,5 x 102 cm
Artwork: 63 x 79,5 cm

A self-taught painter born in Nancy, Simonin first worked as an Art Deco cabinetmaker before emerging as a painter in 1942. Elected a member of the Salon des Artistes Français in 1951 and admitted to the Salon d'Automne in 1952 and 1957, he travelled widely in France and abroad — Greece, Spain, Portugal, Tunisia — bringing back vigorous, realist landscapes and harbour scenes from each stay.