St Paul's Cathedral seen from the Thames

The blue dome of St Paul's Cathedral anchors this view of London, standing tall against a sky that seems to catch fire with streaks of yellow, orange, and pink. André Derain painted this scene in 1906, when his art dealer sent him across the Channel with a specific mission: come back with something to compete with Claude Monet's celebrated London paintings. Where many artists saw fog and gloom, Derain found warmth everywhere. Coral-colored buildings crowd the riverbank, boats dotted with red and blue fill the foreground, and the Thames itself ripples in colors you would never expect from real water.

Derain belonged to a small circle of painters known as the Fauves, which comes from the French phrase for "wild beasts." A critic gave them that name as an insult, shocked by how loud and untamed their colors looked to viewers of the time. These artists were not interested in painting things exactly as they appeared. Instead, they used color to express energy and emotion, letting a bright orange sky or a purple shadow carry the mood of a place. The finished picture turns an ordinary working stretch of the London riverside into something bursting with life and sunshine.