Lot 114 D

In “Bords de l’Arc” Charles Camoin captures the gently glowing colours of his homeland in the south of France. From its source near Pourcieux, the Arc river runs across Aix-en-Provence before finally feeding into the Lagune Étang de Berre, which joins with the Mediterranean west of Marseille, the city where Camoin was born.
Prior to his 1906 journey to the south of France, which he undertook with his friend and fellow artist Albert Marquet and which led to the creation of the work presented here, Camoin mostly lived in Paris. He studied there in the circle around Gustave Moreau and was engaged in an intimate exchange of ideas with artists like Henri Matisse, Albert Marquet and André Derain.
In spite of his proximity to the Fauves group, with whom he exhibited his work in Paris in 1905, Camoin never understood himself as part of a defined movement. His painting, as in the case of the picture here, is distinguished by its subtle palette: the dabbed brushstrokes of the water and foliage’s delicate tones of green, blue and yellow – supplemented with lilac and a pale coral red along the shore – merge into an atmospheric depiction of the glistening southern light and the dynamic nature along the riverbank.