PROVENANCE
Ronald Everson, Montreal
By descent to a Private Collection, Toronto
Sold sale of Fine Canadian Art, Heffel Fine Art Auction House, November 25, 2004, lot 30
Private Collection, Vancouver

In 1906 Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté, one of Canada’s most important Impressionist painters, was living in France, and he was known to have spent much of that year in Brittany, as well as visiting the region of Cernay, 40 kilometres from Paris. The beauty of both these areas made them a magnet for landscape painters at the time. He had been in Paris since 1897 and was exhibiting regularly, and in 1906 showed at the annual Salon of the Société des artistes français at the Grand Palais in Paris.

This painting was first owned by the important Canadian poet Ronald Everson, who spent most of his working life in Montreal. Everson gave the painting this unusual title in reference to the tree in the foreground, which gives the impression of being in movement. Standing in contrast to the still, soft, rounded shapes of the trees behind, it bends forward and away from them. The tree has a delicate quality, which no doubt led Everson to anthropomorphize it in this manner. Suzor-Coté uses light to bring the landscape alive - in this case highlighting the warm colours in the grassy field and backlighting the trees with delicate pastels in the clouded sky.

All prices are in Canadian Dollars