Vue du Leuvehaven à Rotterdam

Boudin was a coast and harbour man before almost anyone thought those worth painting. The older Corot called him the king of skies, and it was Boudin who first pushed the young Monet to set up an easel in the open air. Around 1870 he was working the ports of the Low Countries, and the Leuvehaven was Rotterdam's old inner harbour, a working basin of moored boats and warehouse fronts under the wide, wet light of the river delta. That light is really his subject. The masts and hulls are noted quickly, half in shadow, while most of the canvas goes to the enormous changing sky that Dutch marine painters had prized two centuries before him, and that Boudin came north to stand under himself.