The horizontally layered composition evokes the structure of a seascape: a textured, almost pearly white band at the top occupies about a third of the canvas, suggesting a pale morning sky, streaked by the brushstrokes like clouds or coastal mist. Below this band, a dense, almost uniform blue mass dominates the rest of the composition: this is the ocean, or rather, how the eye perceives it early in the morning, when the low-angled light evens out the tones and the blue seems to almost saturate the entire field of vision.

The texture at the top, striated with a comb, contrasts with the smooth flat areas at the bottom: this opposition between rough material (the sky) and a more serene surface (the water) perfectly captures this pivotal hour of early morning, when the light has not yet fully structured the landscape, when everything still seems suspended between night and day.