Art: The Joy Of Color

Cap Canaille, Cassis, Opus 200, 1889, is a superb example. The day is fading. The tartans, or lateen-rigged fishing boats, triangular scraps of white sail on the blue, are flocking back to port. The pallid horizon is delicately tinted with pink, lavender, yellow. The foreground, with its purple house and lavender rocks, is already darkening. But the sunset has lit up the prismatic shape of the headland to a blazing orange-yellow, a thrilling and almost transcendent intensity. It is the kind of painting that can absorb any amount of looking, and after 10 minutes with it you can appreciate how Signac grasped the sensuous abundance of the world.