Seurat and the Sea Is Postcard Perfect

Art Review

Seurat’s seascapes, painted during summer trips to the Channel coast, were intended to “cleanse one’s eyes of the days spent in the studio.”

LONDON — The Courtauld Gallery’s Seurat and the Sea exhibition, coincidentally or not, follows closely on the heels of the National Gallery’s major survey of the same artistic movement. At least one painting traveled directly from that event without returning home. While the National Gallery, with its collection from the Kröller-Müller Museum, focused on the intense themes of socialism and politics, this exhibition—claimed to be the UK’s first dedicated to Seurat’s seascapes—presents a more serene collection, akin to displaying exquisite postcards.

This is no critique, as Seurat’s paintings were designed to evoke such a feeling. Of the approximately 45 canvases he created, over half are seascapes from summer visits to the Channel coast between 1885 and 1890. He envisioned these works as a means to refresh the eyes from the confines of the studio.

The limited scope of the seascapes highlights the constraints of pointillism as a technique. Like the National Gallery’s exhibit, this one includes a diagram illustrating Seurat’s use of opposing color theory to craft an optical illusion of tonal depth through numerous short strokes and dots of color. While the Impressionists, many of whom are part of the Courtauld’s collection, captured the vibrant seaside light with skillfully chosen pastel contrasts, Seurat’s brilliance emerges from his dense clusters of dots. The color palette is mostly primary tones, yet the entire visual field is finely dispersed with these elements.

Georges Seurat, “The Channel of Gravelines, and Evening” (1890)

Georges Seurat, “Study for ‘The Channel of Gravelines, an Evening'” (1890)

The exhibition shines in its display of preparatory studies alongside the final works. For instance, “Le Bec du Hoc (Grandcamp)” from the Tate is paired with its smaller study from the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. The study shows the distinctive rock formation depicted with larger, consistently distributed points, while the sea is defined with elongated horizontal dashes. In the final piece, the dashes are more pronounced, creating a dynamic and chaotic atmosphere. Similarly, the study for “The Channel of Gravelines: An Evening” (1890) from the Victoria & Albert Museum offers a stark contrast to the finished piece at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, with its smooth Conte crayon outlines against a flat beach.

The repeated explanation of pointillism’s mechanics in the captions suggests a lack of deeper artistic or intellectual exploration. Statements like “Seurat’s radical technique consisted of juxtaposing dashes and dots of unmixed colour on the canvas” and “Each colour appears in the painting in varying intensities, harmonising the scene as a whole” could describe almost any piece in the collection. However, the exhibition’s true achievement is showcasing Seurat’s unwavering dedication to his technique, maintaining consistency even during leisure. These artworks encourage viewers to immerse themselves in their tranquility, much like the serene coastal scenes they portray.