“Beauty at the Well”
“Beauty at the Well” is a lovely oil on canvas painting by the French academic and neoclassical artist, Guillaume Seignac. Like most of his pieces, it is undated, so falls to sometime in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century.
Seignac studied academic and classical style art. One of his teachers was noted artist William-Adolphe Bouguereau, who instilled in Seignac an appreciation for the French neoclassicists of the early nineteenth century.
In this painting, a woman is drawing water from a well. She is silhouetted behind by a gentle green forest. The jug she is using is an ancient Greek container, exquisitely detailed and painted in the foreground. She glances behind her, holding one hand to her breast. Purple irises offer a cool color to an otherwise warm palette.
The position of the woman in this piece is highly reminiscent of ancient Greek sculptures and pays homage to the western classical standard of beauty. The orientation and position of the woman’s body is set in the official sculpture standards established in 450 BC, Greece, by Polykleitos and his Canon of Proportions.
The woman’s head is tilted at a 45-degree angle, her shoulders are angled downward while her hips are angled upward. One arm is engaged while the other is relaxed. Though the painting does not depict her legs, the standards state that the opposite leg is engaged while the other leg is relaxed.
The woman is dressed in a Grecian robe. The fabric gently falls around her body, suggesting curves and form. Her hair is pulled softly back in a bun. The femininity of the women and curves of their bodies in Guillaume’s work appealed to Art Nouveau collector’s as well as classicists.
“Beauty at the Well” is currently in a private collection.
For more on Guillaume Seignac, please visit his short biography here.
You can find more artists to learn about here.
