Signed 20th Century Impressionist Street Scene, Oil on Canvas. Panoramic Paris street scene. Signed "S. Divins" bottom left. 

Overall: 30 1/4 X 54 1/4 in. 

Sight: 23 1/4 X 47 1/4 in. 

Depth: 2 1/2 in. 

#2741 . 

Urban landscape paintings, often dubbed cityscapes, have likely existed as long as humans have banded together to form cities. In Akrotiri, on the Greek island of Santorini, a fresco dating to the 16th Century BC depicts boats traveling between two fortified cities, captured in elaborate detail. A nearly complete cityscape of Rome was uncovered under the Trajan Baths in 1997, indicating a shift in understanding of perspective and representation. Partial images of sprawling cities can be found in many illuminated manuscripts from the early Middle Ages, and in 1335 Ambrogio Lorenzetti (c.1290-1348) painted a fresco in Pinacoteca, Siena that is generally acknowledged as the first modern cityscape in the history of Western Art. Venetian painters in the early 15th Century were responsible for the first “Golden Age” of cityscapes, attracting artists from all over Europe ever since to capture the canals and architecture in an endless array of mediums and styles. The city of Delft in Western Netherlands became a second Venice, resulting in the “Delft School” that flourished throughout the 17th Century, inspiring cityscape interpretations by artists in London, Madrid, and Paris. During the second half of the 19th Century Napoleon III appointed Georges-Eugène Haussmann to rebuild the city of Paris into the most modern European metropolis. This resulted in the new Paris becoming the international hub for cityscape painting, particularly among the Impressionists. From Edouard Manet to Antonio DeVity, Camille Pissarro to Eugène Galien-Laloue, and Edouard-Léon Cortès to Antoine Blanchard, artists continue to find inspiration in the City of Light.