S et against the rolling hills of Labastide-du-Vert, Le Bassin principal du parc de Marquayrol à Labastide-du-Vert is a joyous expression of Henri Martin’s most beloved landscape. In 1900, Martin left Paris for his native region in the southwest of France. Seeking a quieter existence and more expansive vista from which to paint, he purchased Marquayrol, a large seventeenth-century house settled on nearly thirty acres of land. The estate became Martin's oasis; it was there that he would spend the months between May and November, revelling in the sunshine and clear skies that he dearly missed in Paris. Much like Claude Monet at Giverny or Henri Le Sidaner at Gerberoy, it was in Marquayrol, amongst his verdant garden blooming with geraniums and sparkling with the reflections of its fountains, that Martin produced his most harmonious compositions. Le Bassin principal du parc de Marquayrol à Labastide-du-Vert demonstrates Martin’s mastery as a colorist and stands among the greatest works of his oeuvre.

Martin cultivated a lush Italianate garden at Marquayrol, replete with sun-dappled paths, two fountains set in stone basins, and a pergola shrouded in Wisteria that offered shelter from the midday sun. This idyllic garden, as well as the house itself and the nearby town, provided him with inexhaustible inspiration and sustained his curiosity for more than forty years. It was also at Marquayrol that Martin's unique style, a blend of Impressionist ideology and Pointillist brushwork, reached its apex. Painting from nature, the methodology espoused by the Impressionists, allowed Martin to capture the grounds of Marquayrol with meditated scrutiny: each flower bed, shuttered window and potted plant is painstakingly rendered with fine touches of oil paint in a series of works that all but comprises a map of the estate’s grounds. Claude Juskiewenski writes, 'By discovering Marquayrol, Henri Martin had found his equilibrium, his personal and artistic fulfillment' (Claude Juskiewenski, Henri Martin 1860-1943, 1993, p. 103).

Having illustrated the gardens of Marquayrol from innumerable vantage points, the present work is one of Martin’s most ambitious undertakings. It depicts a panoramic view of the property, including the entire bassin principal and surrounding landscape. Here, Martin plays with depth, using the picturesque town of Labastide-du-Vert, which peeks through the foliage, as a window to the world beyond his verdant sanctum. In doing so, he increases the breadth of his canvas, the effect of which dovetails with the notable absence of figures to create an overwhelming sense of tranquility. Shimmering light and shadow pervade every inch of the composition, instilled by Martin’s application of the formal qualities of the Neo-Impressionists. In the present work, the artist opposes cool tones of green with fiery punches of red, allowing the colors to blend in the retina rather than directly onto the palette. Martin himself describes using a “loaded brush,” to achieve heightened luminosity through “the breaking up of tone.” Like Pierre-Auguste Renoir, who famously employed white for pictorial effect, Martin judiciously daubs pure titanium white to the surface, imbuing select elements of the composition with the divine quality of precious stones.

Executed circa 1905, the present work sits just beyond the most significant inflection point in the artist’s career. Formerly a Symbolist painter, with the acquisition of Marquayrol at the turn of the century, Martin abandoned his preoccupation with allegory and myth to embrace the representation of nature, a timeless subject which he filtered through the lens of Neo-Impressionist color theory. While many paintings from this period continue to evoke a sense of ethereal, contemplative spirituality consistent with Symbolist ideals, their success is grounded in a nuanced treatment of color, line and composition, a unique synthesis through which the artist deftly fuses the allegorical with the natural world. In Le Bassin principal du parc de Marquayrol à Labastide-du-Vert, Martin casts a glow over the landscape, imbuing the composition with palpable energy absent in his earlier output. Humming with warmth and light, the present work is an exceptional example of what the artist’s son, Jacques Martin-Ferrières, calls “a poetical evocation hued by a thousand colors” (Jacques Martin-Ferrières, Henri Martin, Paris, 1967, p. 35).