The impressionist style of painting is characterized chiefly by

concentration on the general impression produced by a scene

or object and the use of unmixed primary colors and small
strokes to simulate actual reflected light.

Impressionism, French Impressionnisme, a major movement, first

in painting and later in music, that developed chiefly in France
during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Impressionist painting
comprises the work produced between about 1867 and 1886 by a
group of artists who shared a set of related approaches and
techniques. The most conspicuous characteristic of Impressionism
was an attempt to accurately and objectively record visual reality in
terms of transient effects of light and colour. The principal
Impressionist painters were Claude Monet, Pierre Auguste
Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, Berthe Morisot, Armand
Guillaumin, and Frdric Bazille, who worked together, influenced
each other, and exhibited together independently. Edgar
Degas and Paul Czanne also painted in an Impressionist style for a
time in the early 1870s. The established painter douard Manet,
whose work in the 1860s greatly influenced Monet and others of the
group, himself adopted the Impressionist approach about 1873.

The word ``impressionniste'' was printed for the first time in

the Charivari on the 25 April 1874 by Louis Leroy, after Claude
Monet's landscape entitledImpressions: soleil levant [Impressions].
This word was used to call Exposition des Impressionnistes an
exhibit hold in the salons of the photographer Nadar and organized
by the ``Socit anonyme des peintres, sculpteurs et graveurs''
[``Anonymous society of painters, sculptors and engravers''],
composed of Pissarro,
Monet, Sisley, Degas, Renoir, Czanne, Guillaumin and Berthe
Morisot.

Impression: soleil levant

Claude Monet
The Founders
The founders of this society were animated by the will to break with
the official art. The official theory that the color should be dropped
pure on the canvas instead of getting mixed on the palette will only
be respected by a few of them and only for a couple of years. In
fact, the Impressionism is a lot more a state of the mind than a
technique; thus artists other than painters have also been qualified
of impressionists. Many of these painters ignore the law of
simultaneous contrast as established by Chevreul in 1823. The
expressions ``independants'' or ``open air painters'' may be more
appropriate than ``impressionists'' to qualify those artists
continuing a tradition inherited from Eugne Delacroix, who thought
that the drawing and colors were a whole, and English landscape
painters, Constable, Bonington and especially William Turner, whose
first law was the observation of nature, as for landscape painters
working in Barbizon and in the Fontainebleau forest.

Eugne Boudin, Stanislas Lpine and the Dutch Jongkind were

among the forerunners of the movement. In 1858, Eugne Boudin
met in Honfleur Claude Monet, aged about 15 years. He brought
him to the seashore, gave him colors and taught him how to
observe the changing lights on the Seine estuary. In those years,
Boudin is still the minor painter of the Pardon de Sainte-Anne-la-
Palud, but is on the process of getting installed on the Normandy
coast to paint the beaches of Trouville and Le Havre. On the Cte de
Grce, in the Saint-Simon farm, he attracts many painters
including Courbet, Bazille, Monet, Sisley. The last three will meet in
Paris in the free Gleyre studio, and in 1863 they will discover a
porcelain painter, Auguste Renoir.

At the same time, other artists wanted to bypass the limitations

attached to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and were working quai des
Orfvres in the Swiss Academy; the eldest, from the Danish West
Indies, was Camille Pissarro; the other two were Paul Czanne and
Armand Guillaumin.

Le ``Salon des Refuss''

These people were highly impressed by the works of Edouard
Manet, and became outraged when they learned that he was
refused for the 1863 Salon. The indignation was so high among the
artistic population that Napoleon III allowed the opening of a
``Salon des Refuss'', where Manet, Pissarro, Jongkind, Cals,
Chintreuil, Fantin-Latour, etc. showed their works. Le Djeuner sur
l'herbe provoked a great enthusiasm among the young painters,
who saw represented in Manet's painting many of their concerns.
They started meeting around him in the caf Guerbois, 9, avenue de
Clichy, and thus creating l'cole des Batignolles.

Le Djeuner sur l'herbe

Edouard Manet

The 1866 Salon accepted the works of some of them: Degas,

Bazille, Berthe Morisot, Sisley; Monet exposed the portrait
of Camille, Pissarro, les Bords de la Marne en hiver; Manet,
Czanne, Renoir were refused, and Emile Zola wrote
in l'Evenement a diatribe which made him the official upholder of
those newcomers bearing an more revolutionary attitude in the
conception than in the still traditional painting. The main distinction
lies in the attraction for color and the liking of light; but Berthe
Morisot remained faithful to Manet's teaching; Degas was mixed
between his admiration of Ingres and the
Italian Renaissance painters; Czanne attempted to ``faire du
Poussin sur nature''; Claude Monet himself, in la Terrasse au
Havre and les Femmes au jardin (1866, Louvre, salles du Jeu de
Paume), is far from announcing his future audacity.
 THE ART OF IMPRESSIONISM

CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)

'Waterlilies and Japanese Bridge', 1899 (oil on canvas)

Impressionism was an art movement in France at the end of the 19th century.
The Impressionists were a group of artists renowned for their innovative painting
techniques and approach to using colour in art.

THE IMPRESSIONIST ARTISTS

 ALFRED SISLEY (1839-99)
'Flood at Port Marley', 1876 (oil on canvas)

Many artists contributed to the first exhibition of Impressionist painting in 1874

but Claude Monet (1840-1926), Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), Camille
Pissarro (1831-1903), Edgar Degas (1834-1917), Alfred Sisley (1839-99) and
Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901) were the main figures
who formed the backbone of the movement.

IMPRESSIONIST PAINTING TECHNIQUE

 CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)
'Wheatstacks - End of Summer', 1890-91 (oil on canvas)

The Impressionists were excited by contemporary developments in colour theory

which helped their search for a more exact analysis of the effects of colour and
light in nature. They abandoned the conventional idea that the shadow of an
object was made up from its colour with some brown or black added. Instead,
they enriched their colours with the idea that the shadow of an object is broken
up with dashes of its complementary colour. For example, in an Impressionist
painting the shadow on an orange may have some strokes of blue painted into it
to increase its vitality.

The Impressionists sought to capture the atmosphere of a particular time of day

or the effects of different weather conditions on the landscape. In order to
capture these fleeting effects they had to work quickly. They applied their paint
in small brightly colored strokes which meant sacrificing much of the outline and
detail of their subject. Their painting technique put them at odds with the
conservative Acadmie of the French artistic establishment who valued subtle
colour and precise detail which was carefully crafted with great skill in the artist's
studio. What the Acadmie failed to appreciate was the freshness of Impressionist
colour and the energy of their brushwork which revealed a spontaneity that had
only previously been valued in the sketches of the old masters. However, the
public grew to love the vitality of the Impressionist technique and in time
Impressionism grew to become the most popular movement in the history of art.
 IMPRESSIONISM AND PHOTOGRAPHY

EDGAR DEGAS (1834-1917)

'Four Dancers', 1899 (oil on canvas)

The Impressionists further upset the Acadmie with their composition

techniques. Traditionally, artists had created images where the lines, shapes,
tones and colours were arranged in a way that led the eye to the focal point of
the painting. This was the most important area of the picture and was usually
situated in a central position. It was considered poor composition if the
background or edges of the painting detracted from the focal point. True to form,
the Impressionists broke this rule.

At this time, photography was in its early stages of development. As there was
often a difference between what the photographer saw in the viewfinder of his
camera and what actually appeared on the negative, photographers would crop
their pictures to improve their composition. This resulted in some unusual
arrangements which emphasized shapes and forms at the edge of the image.
Some of Impressionists, like Degas' in his 'Four Dancers', embraced the
asymmetrical effects of cropping and made it a prominent feature of their
compositions.

IMPRESSIONISM AND JAPANESE PRINTS

ANDO HIROSHIGE (1797-1858)

'The 53 Stations of the Tokaido (no.26)', 1831-34 (woodblock print)

The bold designs of Japanese woodblock prints, popular in France at the time,
were another influence on the Impressionists. Their asymmetrical arrangements,
contrasting large areas of flat colour with patches of intricate pattern, offered a
compositional format that the Impressionists could use to develop their ideas
about colour. Sometimes, even the most avant-garde artists need the security of
knowing that the path they have chosen to follow has some roots in tradition.
The compositions of the Ukiyo-e masters such as Hokusai and Hiroshige offered
the Impressionists this precedent of tradition, albeit from another culture, and
consequently the confidence to forge ahead with their new ideas.
 IMPRESSIONISM AND LANDSCAPE PAINTING

CAMILLE PISSARRO (1831-1903)

'Gele Blanche - Hoarfrost', 1873 (oil on canvas)

The Impressionists were the first group of artists to embrace painting 'en plein
air' (painting outside). This was partially due to the introduction of paint in tubes
which, for the first time, enabled artists to carry all their studio equipment around
in a case. They also found it necessary to paint outdoors because they were
committed to observing the effects of light on colour in nature. Consequently
landscapes, both in the town and countryside, became their most natural and
influential subject and is what we immediately associate with Impressionism
today.

IMPRESSIONISM AND FIGURE COMPOSITION

 HENRI DE TOULOUSE-LAUTREC (1864-1901)
'At the Moulin Rouge', 1892-95 (oil on canvas)

Impressionist portraits and figure compositions with identifiable individuals were

painted by Renoir, Degas and Lautrec. 'At the Moulin Rouge' is a figure
composition by Lautrec which is strongly influenced by photographic cropping
and the design of Japanese prints. In this revolutionary work, Lautrec includes a
self portrait beside his tall cousin, Gabriel Tapi de Clyran, as they walk away
from the can-can dancer La Goulue who is seen fixing her hair. Just in front of
them is a seated group that includes the entertainers La Maracona and the red-
headed Jane Avril, the writer and critic Edouard Dujardin and the photographer
Paul Sescau. The woman whose green lamp lit face is cropped by the edge of the
picture is thought to be another dancer, May Milton.

IMPRESSIONISM AND STILL LIFE

 PIERRE AUGUSTE RENOIR (1841-1919)
'Fruits of the Midi', 1881 (oil on canvas)

Still life was not hugely popular with the Impressionists, mainly because it was
not a 'plein air' subject suited to capturing the atmospheric qualities of light and
color. However there are a few outstanding examples such as Renoir's 'Fruit of
the Midi' whose fruit and vegetables are carefully chosen to create a range of
prismatic colours that span the Impressionist spectrum.

Whether in their landscapes, figure paintings or still lifes, the Impressionists

celebrated and transformed the commonplace, finding beauty in misty harbour
at sunrise, dignity in the labour of the common man, joy in leisure of the middle
classes, and radiance in a bowl of fruit.

IMPRESSIONISM AND THE SALON

 CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)
'Impression Sunrise', 1872 (oil on canvas)

THE SALON DE PARIS

During the 19th century, the Acadmie des Beaux Arts was the pillar of the French
artistic establishment and it held an annual open exhibition at the Salon de Paris.
The jury of the Acadmie saw itself as the protector of the artistic traditions of
its day and upheld these by controlling the standard of paintings that were
accepted into the Salon exhibitions. Any new work that challenged their
standards was rejected and many of the young innovative Impressionist painters
of the day frequently found themselves excluded from this mainstream
exhibition.

THE SALON DES REFUSES

In 1863, an alternative exhibition called the Salon des Refuses was mounted
comprising paintings and sculptures rejected by the official Salon. Ironically, Les
Refuses attracted more attention than the original exhibition and provided the
ideal platform for displaying new Impressionist art to the public. However, future
Salon des Refuses did not become a regular feature and in 1874 some of the
rejected artists organized an alternative exhibition in the studio of the Parisian
photographer, Nadar. It was this exhibition which unearthed the name that
embodied a new approach to painting. Louis Leroy, a journalist and critic for the
satirical magazine 'Le Charivari', wrote a scathing review entitled The Exhibition
of the Impressionists. Impressionist was meant as a term of ridicule aimed, in
particular, at Claude Monets painting of the misty morning harbour at Le Havre,
'Impression: Sunrise'. However, the sarcastic title appealed to both the artists and
the public and the name stuck. The exhibition at Nadar's became the first of eight
Impressionist exhibitions between 1874 and 1886.

IMPRESSIONISM AND BEYOND

VINCENT VAN GOGH (1853-1890)

'Olive Trees with Yellow Sky and Sun', 1890 (oil on canvas)

Impressionism was the first movement in the canon of modern art and had a
massive effect on the development of art in the 20th century. Like most
revolutionary styles Impressionism was gradually absorbed into the mainstream
and its limitations became frustrating to the succeeding generation. Artists such
as Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Czanne, Paul Gauguin and Georges Seurat, although
steeped in the traditions of Impressionism, pushed the boundaries of the style in
different creative directions and in doing so laid the foundations of art in the
20th century. For historical convenience these artists have been labeled as Post
Impressionists but, apart from their Impressionist influence, they don't have
much in common. Van Gogh pushed art towards Expressionism, Czanne
towards Cubism, and Gauguin and Seurat towards Fauvism and Divisionism.

IMPRESSIONISM FACTS

CLAUDE MONET (1840-1926)

'Rouen Cathedral in Full Sunlight', 1893 (oil on canvas)
 The name 'Impressionism' comes from a sarcastic review of Monet's
painting, 'Impression, Sunrise' (1873), written by Louis Leroy in the satirical
magazine 'Le Charivari'.

Impressionism was a style of painting that used a more scientific analysis

of colour to capture the effects of light in nature.

The main artists associated with Impressionism were Claude Monet, Pierre
Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Edgar Degas, Alfred Sisley and Henri
Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec.

The Impressionists painted with small strokes of pure colours which mixed
in the eye of the spectator when viewed from a distance.

The Impressionists were the first group of artists to embrace painting 'en
plein air' (painting outside).

The Impressionists had to paint quickly to capture the atmosphere of a

particular time of day or the effects of different weather conditions on the
landscape.

The speed of the Impressionists' painting technique forced them to

sacrifice accurate line and detail in favour of atmospheric effect.

The subject most suited to the Impressionist technique was landscape, but
they also painted portraits, still lifes and figure compositions.

Impressionist compositions were strongly influenced by the development

of photography and the discovery of Japanese woodcuts.

Impressionism is now seen as the first movement in modern art, and had
a huge influence on the development of art in the 20th century.

POST IMPRESSIONISM - THE ROOTS OF MODERN ART

 VINCENT VAN GOGH (1853-1890)
'View of Arles-Orchard in Bloom with Poplars', 1890 (oil on canvas)

Post Impressionism was not a formal movement or style. The Post Impressionists
were a few independent artists at the end of the 19th century who rebelled
against the limitations of Impressionism. They developed a range of personal
styles that focused on the emotional, structural, symbolic and spiritual elements
that they felt were missing from Impressionism. Their combined contributions
form the artistic roots of modern art for the next eighty years.

Impressionism was the first movement in the canon of modern art. Like most
revolutionary styles it was gradually absorbed into the mainstream and its
limitations became frustrating to the succeeding generation. Artists such
as Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Czanne, Paul Gauguin and Georges Seurat, although
steeped in the traditions of Impressionism, pushed the boundaries of the style in
different creative directions and in doing so laid the foundations for the art of
the 20th century. Their name was derived from the title of the exhibition 'Manet
and the Post-Impressionists' which was organized in London by the English artist
and critic Roger Fry in the winter of 1910-11. For historical convenience these
artists have been labeled as Post Impressionists but, apart from their
Impressionist influence, they don't have that much in common.

PAUL GAUGUIN (1848-1903)

PAUL GAUGUIN (1848-1903)

'The Yellow Christ', 1889 (oil on canvas)

Cloisonnism, Synthetism and Symbolism were some of the terms associated with
the Post Impressionist paintings of Paul Gauguin in order to distinguish them
from Impressionism.

The term Cloisonnism was coined by the critic Edouard Dujardin and refers to the
jewellery technique of inlaying metal surfaces with 'cloisonn' enamel colors (the
word 'cloison' in French means a 'border'). The decorative effect of this process
resembled the bold outlines and flat color of Gauguin's art.
In Synthetism, the artist's aim was to 'synthetize' his feelings with the elements
of his painting by simplifying its shapes and amplifying its color to increase its
emotional and expressive power. The result was seen as a symbol of the artist's
thoughts and feelings and consequently Gauguin's style of painting was also
referred to as 'Symbolism'.

'The Yellow Christ' is a classic example of his style. It depicts some traditional
Breton women praying at a roadside grotto but it is not a documentary illustration
of the scene; it is an attempt to portray the spiritual vision that they experience
in their prayer. In this painting Gauguin was inspired by the naive simplicity of a
wooden 17th century crucifix that he saw in the nearby church at Tremalo and
he uses its primitive form and autumnal yellow color as a key to the work. He
then simplifies his drawing, boldly outlines his shapes and exaggerates his color
to magnify the heightened emotion of the women's prayerful meditation.

PAUL GAUGUIN (1848-1903)

'Tahitian Landscape', 1893 (oil on canvas)

Gauguin's work can be split into two phases: an early period spent painting
around the rustic town of Port Aven in Brittany; and a later period (post 1891) in
search of the primitive lifestyle in Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands in the South
Pacific. He fused his symbolic use of colour with images of both environments to
create a highly personal and expressive vision that pushed art towards the
exhilarating style of Fauvism.

VINCENT VAN GOGH (1853-90)

VINCENT VAN GOGH (1853-1890)

'Wheatfield with Crows', 1890 (oil on canvas)

Vincent Van Gogh embraced the vivid color of Impressionism but discarded any
Impressionist ideas about the careful analysis and effects of color and light in
nature. This was far too scientific an approach for this temperamental Dutchman
whose gut instincts were tuned to the expressive power of color. When
Impressionism was filtered through the heightened perception of Van Gogh's
vision, the results pushed art towards Expressionism, an exploration of the
spiritual and emotional side of art.

PAUL CZANNE (1839-1906)

 PAUL CZANNE (1839-1906)
'The Chteau at Mdan', 1880 (oil on canvas)

Paul Czanne believed that the Impressionists had lost one of the classical
hallmarks of great art: a structured composition where the visual elements are
carefully refined and balanced to work in harmony with one another. He felt that
the Impressionists' technique was naturally limited, principally because they had
to work so quickly to capture the fleeting effects of atmospheric conditions.
Czanne wanted to make paintings whose compositions were more tightly
organized and "make of Impressionism something solid and durable, like the art
of the museums ".

He called his pictures 'constructions after nature' in which elements from the
three-dimensional world were translated into patterns of shapes and colors
arranged on a flat canvas. The way that Czanne structured and abstracted his
paintings with carefully modulated color pushed art towards the revolutionary
style that was Cubism.

GEORGES SEURAT (1859-1891)

 GEORGES SEURAT(1859-1891)
Detail: 'A Sunday Afternoon on the le de la Grande Jatte', 1884 (oil on canvas)

Georges Seurat's frustration with the limitations of Impressionism, particularly its

lack of accurate line and detail, drove him to develop the technique of Pointillism
or as it was otherwise called, Neo-Impressionism. This was a more scientific
approach to the mixture of color which was applied in small dots of paint that
blended optically when viewed from a distance.
 GEORGES SEURAT(1859-1891)
Study: 'A Sunday Afternoon on the le de la Grande Jatte',1884 (oil on canvas)

You often see works by Seurat that look more like Impressionism than Pointillism.
This is because he painted his sketches outside using an Impressionistic
technique to quickly capture the fleeting effects of natural light and color.

GEORGES SEURAT(1859-1891)
'A Sunday Afternoon on the le de la Grande Jatte', 1884 (oil on canvas)
He would then take these preparatory sketches back to his studio and rework
them using his more methodical Pointillist technique. This allowed him to take a
more considered and classical approach to composition, using sharper lines and
more clearly defined shapes while still retaining the vitality of Impressionist light
and color.

POST IMPRESSIONISM NOTES

PAUL GAUGUIN (1848-1903)

'Portrait of the Artist with the Yellow Christ', 1889 (oil on canvas)

The Post Impressionists were a few independent artists at the end of the
19th century who rebelled against the limitations of Impressionism to
develop a range of personal styles that influenced the development of art
in the 20th century.

The art of Paul Gauguin was a major influence in the development

of Fauvism.
 The art of Vincent Van Gogh was an influence on Expressionism in the 20th
century.

The art of Paul Czanne was an influence on the Cubists at the start of the
20th century.

The analytical method of Seurat's Pointillism influenced those artists who

adopted more calculated approach to painting, particularly in the
development of abstract art.