Oil painting, 'A Barge', François Bocion, Swiss school, 1855

A barge laden with barrels in the foreground with a rowing boat coming alongside while three figures are manoeuvring; a sailing boat in the left background.

Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend

Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend, listed in the 1868 post-mortem register of the contents of his villa in Lausanne (V&A R/F MA/1/T1181) as 'Oil on Millboard. A Barge. By F. Bocion. Signed. Swiss. Dated 1855'; bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend, 1868.

Historical significance: This painting is one of a group of 16 paintings bequeathed to the museum by the Rev. Townshend who had a villa in Lausanne where he spent the winter.
The composition combines a genre scene involving fishers and sailors with a lake view, which would become the main thematic of his oeuvre. It is a fine example of what M. Reymondin (1989) called Bocion's 'youth's' paintings under the influence of the French masters he was acquainted with while residing in France.
The support suggests that the artist depicted outdoors directly after the motif but this does not exclude that he reworked the composition in his studio as Bocion used both practises.
The artist focused here on the effects of a bright sunlight on different textures: the water surface, the wooden carcase of the boat and the fabric of the clothes.
Although this work is reminiscent of the Realist art, it also displays a very personal style he would gradually improve throughout his career.
Comparable compositions include: The Bocion Family Fishing, dated 1877, Musée cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne, and Sailing Boats at Sunset, dated 1885, Musée Jenish, Vevey.

François Bocion (1828-1890) was born in Lausanne. He first trained with Christian Gottlieb Steinlen (1779-1847) in Vevey and subsequently with François Bonnet (1811-1894) in Lausanne. In Paris in 1845, Bocion entered the atelier of Louis-Aimé Grosclaude (1784-1869) and later that of Charles Gleyre (1806-1874) and befriended Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) and other important exponents of the Realist movement. Back in Lausanne in 1849 he became a teacher at the Ecole moyenne et industrielle of Lausane, a position he held until his death. At the same time, he had an extensive output with several travels abroad. He exhibited in Paris, Vienna, Anvers, London and was a founder member of the Swiss society of watercolorists (1884).

This painting was executed shortly after Bocion's return to Lausanne and inaugurates one of the main thematic of the artist: lake views here combined with a genre scene in the foreground. Bocion focused here on the rendering of a bright sunlight in a broad albeit restrained brushwork. The attention on atmospheric effect and the direct observation of nature were characteristic of the Realist movement emerged in France in the 1840s. His oeuvre is however marked by peaceful scenes such as the present one.

1587-1869