9 place de la Madeleine - Paris 8, 21h40 — Acrylic on Paper by Arnaud Quercy

About This Artwork

Arrive at the Madeleine at twenty to ten, when the great Greek temple stands floodlit against the night and its restaurants fill with evening tables. A grey arc lifts the colonnade; blue and green cool the square; ochre and orange glow with warmth; purple presses against black — public stone and the murmur of late diners. This is monumental Paris at its most theatrical and inviting.

This is one of the 72 Facets of Paris, born of a piano waltz of the same name, each of its seventy-two measures the harmony of a Parisian place at a given hour. Here the chords are C−7♭5 and F7 — rich and resolving — and as night falls the dance draws toward its close, circling back toward the prelude with the grandeur of the lit temple.

Acrylic on paper, 18 × 13 cm, signed on the reverse. A striking, statement original that carries the floodlit majesty of the Madeleine home — an evening of grand Paris to own forever.