L'Illustration, No. 3689, 8 Novembre 1913

Twenty‑two years ago the narrator spent a summer in Roscoff, a tiny Breton port where stone churches loom like ancient anchors and two elderly sisters tend a modest garden of pigeons in a narrow courtyard. Their simple, child‑like purity and the rhythm of daily life linger in his memory, as does the mysterious “vivier” on the edge of the sea, a pool that seemed to hold the secret bounty of the deep. Walking past the harbor, he lets his mind fill the empty tanks with fantastical fish and creatures he has never seen, turning the ordinary promenade into a quiet reverie.

This day‑dream foreshadows the arrival of Mathurin Méheut, a young Breton who would devote his life to capturing the hidden anatomy of marine life. Through hundreds of sketches, watercolors and gouaches, Méheut transforms the unseen organs, tentacles and shimmering bodies of fish into vivid, almost surgical studies that pulse with colour and texture. Listeners are invited to share his wonder, exploring the delicate balance between the sea’s mystery and the artist’s relentless curiosity.