Although the title of this artwork suggests that Paris’s most famous cathedral, Notre Dame, is to be the focus of the image, in fact it acts as a mere backdrop to the dream-like, romantic scene unfolding in the foreground between a nude woman at rest and a half-man, half-creature gliding towards her with a floral bouquet. The floating figure and the pink hues of the sky, which are reflected in the iconic River Seine below, enhance this surreal fantasy which Chagall so often creates. According to Jean-Michel Foray, the former director of the Marc Chagall Museum in Nice, however, we shouldn’t push too hard in trying to ‘decrypt’ what the scenes mean: ‘We cannot interpret them, because they are simply part of Chagall’s world, like figures from a dream.’

Lithograph in colours, 1980, on Arches paper, signed in pencil, numbered from the edition of 50, published by Maeght Editeur, Paris, image: 92.7 x 59.7 cm. (36 ½ x 23 ½ in.), sheet: 115.6 x 74.9 cm. (45 ½ x 29 ½ in.)