Semaphore of the Beg-Meil, Brittany 1904

Maxime Maufra made this landscape with oils on canvas. Looking at it, I can almost feel the wind whipping off the Brittany coast and the cool sea air. There’s such freedom in Maufra’s brushstrokes, especially the blues and whites, colliding to make the sky above the Semaphore. You can see how he’s built up layers of paint, one dab at a time, moving and shifting around the canvas. This feels like plein air painting at its best, about being in a place, translating it, and expressing a moment in time. The horizon line is quite high, but it is still really all about the sky and all the things it is doing up there. I am sure he was watching the light very intently. Artists are always looking at one another's work and asking questions, maybe Maufra was considering what Monet was up to in his Impressionist paintings? Either way, he helps me to look at the world in a fresh way and translate his vision into my own artistic expression.