Four Women at Trouville 1865

Eugène Boudin sketched “Four Women at Trouville” with watercolor, depicting a group of figures on the beach. Here, the voluminous skirts and cloaks serve as symbols of status and identity. These garments echo through art history, from the draped figures of classical sculptures to the Renaissance Madonnas enveloped in flowing robes. Consider the Renaissance portraits where dress and adornment are a display of power, an ambition of nobility. Now, observe the way Boudin captures the women in motion, their forms blurred as if transient apparitions. This recalls the figures in Pompeian frescoes, forever frozen in the moment, or even the fleeting nature of life as captured in vanitas paintings. Each brushstroke, then, echoes a continuous cycle of appearance and disappearance.