Rouen Oil Artwork

The cranes lean out over the water where the Seine still works for a living, hauling cargo in and out of Rouen. Found in Le Perche, deep in the forest at a dealer's stone home, it is an oil of the port at Rouen, cranes and moored boats beneath a wooded hill, signed and dated 1958 in the lower corner. Rouen has been Normandy's great river port for centuries, the last deep harbor on the Seine before the sea, and where most painters chased its famous cathedral this one turned to the working waterfront instead. Sylvie leans it on a mantel or a shelf of books, unframed and honest, a whole working harbor brought indoors.