Venice, The Salute, Green

Venice, The Salute, Green (1908) belongs to Signac's Venice series painted during his 1904 and subsequent visits to the city. The church of Santa Maria della Salute, at the entrance to the Grand Canal, was one of the most painted architectural subjects in European art, and Signac reimagined it through divisionist colour. The 'Green' subtitle refers to the dominant chromatic key of this particular version, typical of the way Signac varied a single motif across multiple colour studies. His Venice paintings are among his most celebrated late-period works.

The Salute's baroque dome and volutes are rendered in mosaic patches of green-tinted grey, contrasting with the warm blue and pink tones of the sky and water. The broad treatment transforms the building's architectural details into a pattern of colour fields. The Grand Canal's surface shimmers in complementary warm and cool reflections.