The Stone Bridge at Rouen 1887

"The Stone Bridge at Rouen" is an etching by Camille Pissarro. As an impressionist, Pissarro was deeply interested in capturing the fleeting moments of everyday life. What do we make of the image he presents? He pictures an industrial landscape, but one softened by the delicate strokes of the etching. This was a period of immense social change, and the bridge becomes a symbol, connecting the old world with the new. It suggests transition and movement, not just of people and goods, but of ideas too. The figures that populate the bridge, are they individuals or just types? Perhaps Pissarro is drawing our attention to the collective experience of modernity, the way industrialization was changing how people lived and related to one another. The mood of the image is not overtly critical, nor celebratory, but reflective.