Johan Barthold Jongkind

Private Collection, United States
Thence by descent to the present owner

Adolf Stein, Sylvie Brame, François Lorenceau and Janine Sinizergues, Jongkind, Catalogue critique de l'oeuvre, peintures, Paris, 2003, vol. I, p. 84, no. 70, illustrated

The panel support is very stable and the colors are clean and bright. There are small areas of inpainting in the upper corners to address rubbing from the frame.
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Bateau-lavoir près du pont-neuf, Paris, was painted just four years after Jongkind first arrived in Paris, in 1846, when he entered the studio of Eugène Isabey with fellow students Théodore Rousseau, Isidore Pils, Eugène Boudin and others. He lived in Montmartre and enjoyed a bohemian lifestyle while exploring the city and painting en plein air. 

Jongkind's Paris paintings from this period often depict views of the Seine, which is usually shown bustling with activity and here with Notre Dame in the background. He understood that  the bateaux-lavoirs of Paris were considered an eyesore by many Parisians (they would soon disappear from the banks of the Seine as laundry facilities moved indoors), but was fascinated by them nonetheless and painted them frequently. A similar view to this is included in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.