Rouault, Georges, Bay of the Dead, 1939
1939
Original color etching and aquatint on Montval paper
76.2 x 56.5 cm
Signed and dated by the artist in the plate lower right, signed by the artist in black ink lower right
Printed by Roger Lacourière, Paris
Catalogue raisonné : Rouault 287
La baie des trépassés is a Breton place well known to sailors, for it is in this cove that the ocean is said to bring back all the dead who have perished venturing into the dangerous Raz de Sein. The bright colors of the glowing sun illuminate the men in an apocalyptic atmosphere. Death seems to be in abeyance: are the silhouettes survivors or skeletons? Is it the ocean in which the red sky is reflected, or the rocks of the bay? Dusk or dawn?
