Framed: 45 1/4 x 45 1/4 x 2 1/2 inches
artist
In addition to painting, Lachman explored the world of cinema, working as a set designer with filmmaker Rex Ingram in France before transitioning to film directing in England at the age of 42. He moved to Hollywood in 1933 under contract with Fox Studios, where his notable projects included Dante’s Inferno (1935), starring Spencer Tracy, and Laurel and Hardy’s Our Relations (1936).
Returning to painting in 1943, Lachman brought a cinematic sensibility to his canvases, combining his mastery of composition, color, and narrative. He was also an accomplished photographer, and his works in both art and film continue to be exhibited worldwide. Lachman passed away in Beverly Hills, California, in 1975, leaving behind a diverse and influential legacy across multiple visual media.
Description
From 1892 to 1893, Claude Monet, the quintessential Impressionist, painted over thirty views of Rouen Cathedral, capturing the Gothic structure at different times of day and recording his shifting perception of light and atmosphere.
In response, Post-Impressionist Harry B. Lachman depicted Saint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet, a 13th-century Parisian church, from a side and slightly elevated viewpoint rather than the frontal perspective favored by Monet. Lachman simplified the church into geometric forms: a rectangular bell tower, rectory windows, elliptical buttresses, triangular pediments, and semicircular arches, set against rectangular sidewalks. The building’s mass appears so substantial that it extends beyond the canvas, emphasizing solidity and structure.
Unlike Monet’s luminous brushwork, Lachman rendered the forms in muted browns, beiges, and deep reds, with flattened light that diminishes atmosphere and highlights architectural permanence. Small figures, a lone carriage and a man talking to a passerby, are dwarfed by the monumental structure, reinforcing a sense of durability and stability. The painting celebrates both the enduring church and Lachman’s modern yet ordered approach, bridging the expressive freedom of Impressionism with the structural clarity of Post-Impressionism.
provenance
Abby M. Taylor Fine Art
Private collection, Greenwich CT
