Fisherman's houses in Sainte-Adresse

Sainte-Adresse sits right next to Le Havre, where the Seine opens into the Channel, and the sea has always shaped it. In the Middle Ages a storm carried away the first village, its church and cemetery with it, and the settlement was rebuilt on higher ground. Corot puts the fishermen's houses up on the dune, a tall narrow stone house among lower roofs, and below them a channel of pale water winding through wide flats of sand. A single mast shows between the buildings. The sky is a flat grey-white, and the light falls evenly on sand, walls and water. The Louvre dates the canvas only to the second quarter of the 19th century. Corot signed it in capitals in the lower left corner, on a patch of darker ground.