The Roofs of Old Rouen, Gray Weather

Artist Camille Pissarro (French, 1830-1903)

Place of OriginFrance

Date1896

DimensionsPainting: 28 7/16 × 36 in. (72.3 × 91.4 cm)
Frame: 40 × 47 × 4 in. (101.6 × 119.4 × 10.2 cm)

MediumOil on canvas

ClassificationPaintings

Credit LinePurchased with funds from the Libbey Endowment, Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1951.361

On View

Toledo Museum of Art Glass Pavilion (2444 Monroe Street), Glass Study Room GP

Label TextCamille Pissarro was suffering from a chronic eye infection that kept him indoors when he painted this view of the northern French city of Rouen through a window of his hotel (he died blind). As he wrote to his son Lucien, also an artist, in February of 1896, “I have found a really exceptional motif in a room of the hotel facing north . . . Just imagine: the whole of old Rouen seen above the roofs, with the Cathedral…and the fantastic roofs, really amazing turrets. Can you picture a . . . canvas filled with ancient, gray, worm-eaten roofs? It’s extraordinary!” Pissarro’s “completely gray picture,” as he described it, is punctuated with terracotta-colored roof tiles and chimneys and a grass-green section of the cathedral’s weathered copper roof. He convincingly conveys the heavy atmosphere of an overcast winter day, achieving his stated desire “to follow the fugitive and admirable effects of nature.”Published ReferencesMourey, G., "Camille Pissarro," Les Arts II, Dec. 1903, p. 40, repr.

Lecompte, G., Camille Pissarro, Paris, 1922, p. 84, repr.

Mauclair, C., Les maitres de l'impressionisme, Paris, 1923, p. 192, repr.

Tabarant, A., Pissarro, Paris, 1924, pl. 33.

Waldmann, E., Die Kunst des Realismus und des Impressionismus, Berlin, 1927, repr. p. 460.

Koenig, E., Camille Pissarro, Paris, 1927, repr.

Holl, J. C., "Pissarro," L'Art Et Les Artistes, February 1928, no. 84, pl. 167, repr.

Pissarro, L. R., and L. Venturi, Camille Pissarro, son art - son oeuvre, Paris, 1939, I, p. 64, no. 973, II, pl. 196.

Rewald, J., ed., Camille Pissarro: Letters to His Son Lucien, New York, 1943, pp. 283, 288, pl. 69.

Rewald, John, "Pissarro's Paris and His France: the Camera Compares," Art News, vol. 42, no. 2, Mar. 1-14, 1943, repr. p. 14 (as "Eglise St. Jacques, Dieppe"); reprinted in Apollo, vol. 136, no. 369, Nov. 1992, repr. p. 292.

Bazin, G., L'epoque impressioniste, Paris, 1947, pl. 38.

Natanson, Thadee, Pissarro, Lausanne, 1950, repr. pl. 38.

25th Birthday Exhibition of Outstanding Art Objects in American Museums, Richmond, Virginia, Museum of Fine Arts, 1961, p. 29, repr. p. 79.

Frankfurter, Alfred, "Collecting in America," Arts in Virginia, vol. 1, no. 2, Winter, 1961, no. 12, p. 17, repr.

Rewald, J., Camille Pissarro, New York, 1963, pp. 43, 144, repr. p. 145 (col.).

Arts Magazine vol. 38, no. 5, February 1963, p. 66.

C. Pissarro, New York, Wildenstein, 1965, no. 64, repr.

Nochlin, L., "Camille Pissarro: The Unassuming Eye," Art News, LXIV, Apr. 1965, p. 61, repr. p. 25.

Nochlin, Linda, "Camille Pissarro: the Unassuming Eye," Art News, vol. 64, no. 2, April 1965, pp. 24-25, 59-62, TMA, p. 61, repr. p. 25.

Toledo Museum of Art, A Guide to the Collections, Toledo, 1966, repr.

Lee, Katharine C., "French Impressionism and Post-Impressionism" Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, vol. 12, no. 3, Autumn 1969, p. 69, repr. p. 68.

Rewald, John, ed., Camille Pissarro, Letters to His Son Lucien, 3rd. ed., Santa Barbara, 1972, pp. 362-363, 366-369, repr. pl. 65, p. 364.

Seurat et le neo-impressionisme, Tokyo, 1972, p. 115, repr. (col.) pl. 26, text in Japanese.

Toledo Museum of Art, The Toledo Museum of Art, European Paintings, Toledo, 1976, pp. 127, 128, pl. 249.

Homage to Camille Pissarro: the Last Years, 1890-1903, Memphis, Dixon Gallery and Gardens, 1980, no. 8, p. 24, repr. (col.) p. 40.

Camille Pissarro 1830-1903, London, Hayward Gallery, 1980, no. 77, p. 139, repr. p. 140.

Shikes, Ralph E., Pissarro, His Life and Work, New York, 1980, pp. 293, 294, repr.

Ravin, James, G., "Art and Medicine: Pissarro," Bulletin, Academy of Medicine of Toledo and Lucas County, vol. 72, no. 2, Mar. - April 1981, p. 21, repr.

Mark, Robert, "The Height of Devotion," The Sciences, vol. 21, no. 9, repr. p. 15.

Ravin, James G., "Ophthalmology and the Arts: Pissarro's Lacrimal Problems," Ophthalmic Forum, vol. 2, no. 1, 1984, p. 56, repr.

Nochlin, Linda, "Camille Pissarro: the Unassuming Eye," in Studies on Camille Pissarro, London, 1986, p. 10, fig. 9.

Impressionism: Selections from Five American Museums, Pittsburgh, Carnegie Museum of Art, 1989, no. 66, p. 154, repr. (col.).

Eitner, Lorenz, An Outline of 19th Century European Painting, New York, 1988, vol. 1, p. 415, vol. 2, repr. p. 221.

The Impressionist and the City, Dallas Museum of Art, 1992, no. 31, pp. 4, 44, repr. (col.).

Pissarro, Joachim, Camille Pissarro, New York, 1993, p. 260, fig. 303, p. 258.

House, John, "Anarchist or Esthete? Pissarro in the City," Art in America, vol. 81, no. 11, Nov. 1993, repr. p. 83 (col).

Ravin, James G., "Pissarro, Dacryocystitis, and the Development of Modern Lacrimal Surgery," Documenta Ophthalmologia, vol. 86, 1994, fig. 3, p. 194.

Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo Treasures, Toledo, 1995, p. 149, repr. (col.).

Roux, Paul de, Pissarro: villes et campagnes, Paris, 1995, p. 58, repr. (col.) p. 59.

Marmor, Michael F. and James G. Ravin, The Eye of the Artist, St. Louis, 1996, fig. 16-2 (col.) p. 190.

Lespinasse, Francois, Rouen: paradis des peintres, Rouen, Leprette, 2003, p. 44, repr. (col.) p. 59.

Mancoff, Debra N., Impressionism: Reflections of Beauty, Lincolnwood, IL, Publications International, 2003, p. 126, repr. (col.), p. 126-127.

Reich, Paula, Toledo Museum of Art: Map and Guide, London, Scala, 2005, p. 40, repr. (col.).

Pissarro, Joachim and Claire Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, Pissarro: Critical Catalogue of Paintings, Milan, Skira; Paris, Wildenstein Institute, 2005, no. 1114, vol. 1, pp. 39, 42, 43, repr. (col.), 44, 267, vol. 3, pp. 702-703, repr. (col.).

Lemonedes, Heather, et al., Monet in Normandy, New York, Rizzoli, 2006, pp. 37-38, repr. (col.) p. 37, fig. 28.

Dumas, Ann, Edgar Degas: The Last Landscapes, London, Menell, 2006, p. 59, fig. 62, repr. (col.) p. 58.

Reich, Paula, Toledo Museum of Art: Map and Guide, London, Scala, 2009, p. 40, repr. (col.).

Marmor, Michael F., and James G. Ravin, The Artist's Eyes: Vision and the History of Art, New York, Abrams, 2009, p. 150, fig. 26.2 (col.) p. 150.

Salome, Laurent, ed., A City for Impressionism: Monet, Pissarro, and Gauguin in Rouen, Paris, Editions Flammarion, 2010, p. 286-288, repr. (col.) cat. no. 69, p. 287.

Solana, Guillermo, Pissarro, Madrid, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, 2013, fig. 17, p. 47, repr. (col.) p. 46.

Monet, an Eye for Landscapes: Innovation in 19th Century French Landscape Paintings, Tokyo, Tokyo Broadcasting System Television, Inc., 2013, p. 208, fig. 1, repr. (col.) p. 158.

Duvivier, Christophe and Josef Helfenstein, eds., Camillie Pissarro: The Study of Modernism, Prestel Verlag, New York, 2021, repr. (col.) p. 295, cat. 142.

Exhibition HistoryParis, Durand-Ruel, Exposition d'oeuvres recentes de Camille Pissarro, 1896, no. 21.

Pittsburgh, Carnegie Institute, Third Annual International Exhibition, 1898, no. 46.

Toledo Museum of Art, One Hundred Paintings by the Impressionists from the Collection of Durand-Ruel & Sons, Paris, 1905, no. 83.

Paris, Galerie Manzi et Joyant, Retrospective C. Pissarro, 1914, no. 13.

Atlanta Art Association, and Birmingham, Alabama, Museum of Art, Paintings, School of France, 1955, no. 20.

Richmond, Virginia, Museum of Fine Arts, 25th Birthday Exhibition of Outstanding Art Objects in American Museums, 1961.

New York, Wildenstein, C. Pissarro, 1965, no. 64.

Memphis, Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Homage to Camille Pissarro: the Last Years, 1890-1903, 1980, no. 8.

London, Hayward Gallery; Paris, Grand Palais; Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Camille Pissarro 1830-1903, 1980-1981, no. 77.

Pittsburgh, Carnegie Museum of Art; Minneapolis Institute of Arts; Kansas City, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art; Saint Louis Art Museum; Toledo Museum of Art, Impressionism: Selections from Five American Museums, 1989-1990, no. 66.

Dallas Museum of Art; Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Impressionist and the City, 1992-1993, no. 31.

Columbus Museum of Art, Edgar Degas: The Last Landscapes, 2006.

Rouen, Musee des Beaux-Arts, A City for Impressionism: Monet, Pissarro and Gauguin in Rouen, June 4 - Sept. 26, 2010.