Factories at both ends of a move

The record dates Factories at Asnieres, Seen from the Quai de Clichy to 1887. Factories are named in three titles in this catalogue: one dated 1882, in the Netherlands, and two dated 1887, on the edge of Paris. Industry is one of the very few subjects here that occurs in two separate periods and nowhere in between.

What the record gives

The canvas measures 72.8 by 53.9 centimetres and is held by the Saint Louis Art Museum, which holds four works in this catalogue, dated 1884, 1887 and 1890. The measured palette reads as yellow.

Asnieres, a name that exists for one year

Asnieres is named in sixteen titles here, and every one of them is dated 1887. Clichy appears in four, all dated 1887 as well. A cluster that dense inside a single year is the strongest dating evidence the titles can give without any outside source, and it is the reason the Paris period can be split into its two halves at all: the 1886 titles name Montmartre, the 1887 titles name the river suburbs. Yellow dominates fifty-six of the ninety-five works dated 1887. What the factories made is not in the record.