Souvenir du golfe de Gênes

In the middle of this picture there is no landscape at all, only a tall plain brown gap. Corot painted the scene around a real opening in a wall, so the view comes in two separate pieces, and the one on the left even carries its own inventory number. The panel belongs with the tall views of Rome and Naples in this room, all made for the same bathroom at Mantes. On the left, trees part to show a pale building on a rocky height, with a glimpse of sea beyond and a small figure among the rocks. On the right, a stream breaks white over boulders under dense trees. The whole thing is nearly two metres high and 92 centimetres wide, and the Louvre dates it only to the second quarter of the 19th century.