The Bridge over the Touques at Deauville

When Boudin painted this in 1895, Deauville was still a young town. The resort had been laid out in the 1860s by the Duc de Morny, half-brother of Emperor Napoleon III, on marshland across the river Touques from the older port of Trouville. In 1884 Boudin bought a plot there and built a villa for himself and his wife. For this picture he set up his easel in an isolated spot by the river, next to a fisherman's house. The bridge between the two towns runs flat across the middle, the river cuts in on a diagonal, and in the foreground lies an upturned boat with the town's name painted on its hull, cut short to Deauvill.