Pissarro made several etchings of nudes bathing in 1894, a year he returned to lithography after a long absence. Baigneuses a L’Ombre is a wonderful example of his ability to create new techniques in printmaking; here he uses tusche (lithographic ink) diluted in benzine or ether, on a zinc plate; he also probably used a greasy crayon (the more traditional lithographic method) as well. The use of tusche is difficult – it’s hard to control. But Pissarro successfully captures the figures playing, and envelopes them in a range of light – from light grays to dark blacks. He wrote: “I have done a whole series of printed lithographic drawings in a romantic style… which seemed to me to have a rather amusing side: Baigneuses, plenty of them, in all sorts of places, in all sorts of paradises.”

In the first state the arm of the woman at the right extended rather vaguely into space; in the second state Pissarro corrected this tendency, and he also selectively lightened the plate, creating more intermediate greys, giving the composition greater structure and movement.