Gabriel Loppé (1825 - 1913)
Paris with St. Augustin and the Eiffel Tower seen from the Moulin de la Galette in Montmartre, 1889
oil on unlined canvas
Reminiscent of Vincent van Gogh’s 1882 panorama of the same view, this atmospheric oil on canvas is the second known Paris cityscape by Gabriel Loppé (1825–1913).
As is well documented, the French Alpine painter was semi-obsessed with the Eiffel Tower, but what makes this painting so compelling is that it was painted the month after the tower opened to the public, the year of the Exposition Universelle in April 1889. With its hazy sweeping vista it looks like a Pissarro or a Caillebotte and just shows what a first rate artist Loppé was even away from his celebrated Alpine and mountain landscapes.
The vista today from the Moulin de la Galette in Montmartre has changed relatively little since Loppé’s time and the building shown on the rue Lepic, right in the foreground, is still there.
