It was during the III Republic that the painter Alfred Smith became hugely popular in Bordeaux. His success at the Salons both in Bordeaux and Paris, as well as entries into the Venice World Fair, was lauded by the critics.
Smith discovered painting from life after frequenting the studios of the Bordeaux naturalist landscape painters, Pradelles, Chabry and Baudit. A friend of the artist Alfred Roll, nicknamed the Zola of the brush, he abandoned the woodland scenes of his debuts which had nevertheless forged his reputation, to paint some of the iconic sites of urban life and the more modest aspects of the city.
This Impressionist-style painting, shown at the Friends of the Arts Salon in Bordeaux in 1892, belongs to a series of four views of Bordeaux made in the late 19th century. In this view of the quays from Place des Quinconces on a rainy winter’s evening, Smith highlights the modernity of the town; he focuses on the double-decker horse-drawn tram next to the hackney cabs, carriages and handcarts; on the cranes and masts, lost in the mist of the background, reflecting the port activity at the heart of the city; but also alludes to the gas lighting and social diversity with the furtive silhouettes of people walking by.
