Terrace in the Rain in Marquayrol 

Henri Martin painted this atmospheric terrace view with oil on canvas. The scene offers a glimpse into the leisure and aesthetic values of late 19th and early 20th-century France. Martin’s broken brushstrokes and soft palette place the work within the Neo-Impressionist movement, which focused on capturing fleeting moments and the interplay of light and color. The terrace, with its balustrade and potted plants, suggests a comfortable, cultivated space - a bourgeois idyll. Painted in a period of rapid industrialization and social change, the artwork embodies a yearning for tranquility and beauty, and a retreat from the urban bustle. This tendency can be seen in the art institution of the time, with the proliferation of landscape paintings and domestic scenes in the Salons. To understand this painting better, we can turn to period journals, exhibition reviews, and social histories that shed light on the values and anxieties of Martin's time.