A slim volume with eight plates. Inevitably, from the publication date (1910), the plates are a rather murky representation of what were (given Corot's liking for greyish tones) fairly murky paintings to start with, and the printer cannot do justice to the subtle tones of grey skies. The text is a somewhat flowery appreciation, but the image shines through of a likeable, intelligent but naive man with a gift for landscape painting. The appreciation occasionally verges on hagiography:

"Here is a serene and cloistered art, something secluded from the traffic of the everyday world, a vision intense rather than wide. I think of Corot as a priest at the altar of one of Nature's innermost sanctuaries celebrating sacramental mysteries. Every picture that came from him is an elevation of the Host."

MB 16-i-2013

The text is available from the Gutenberg project.

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/41674 ( )