Impressionism: Difference between revisions

The Impressionists faced harsh opposition from the conventional art community in [[France]]. The name of the style derives from the title of a [[Claude Monet]] work, ''Impression, soleil levant'' (''[[Impression, Sunrise]]''), which provoked the critic [[Louis Leroy]] to coin the term in a [[Satire|satirical]] 1874 review of the [[First Impressionist Exhibition]] published in the Parisian newspaper ''[[Le Charivari]]''.<ref>The term "impression" indicates the direct impact of surface markers on spiritual perception or experiential cognition.{{Citation |last=Eisenman |first=Stephen F. |title=The Intransigent Artist or How the Impressionists Got Their Name |date=2023-12-22 |work=Critical Readings in Impressionism and Post-Impressionism |pages=149–161 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/jj.8501295.10 |access-date=2024-06-14 |publisher=University of California Press |doi=10.2307/jj.8501295.10 |isbn=978-0-520-94044-4}}</ref> The development of Impressionism in the visual arts was soon followed by analogous styles in other media that became known as [[Impressionist music]] and [[Impressionism (literature)|Impressionist literature]].

[[File:The Fighting Temeraire, JMW Turner, National Gallery.jpg|thumb|left|[[J. M. W. Turner]]'s atmospheric work was influential on the birth of Impressionism, here ''[[The Fighting Temeraire]]'', (1839)]]

[[File:Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Le Moulin de la Galette.jpg|thumb|right|[[Pierre-Auguste Renoir]], ''Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette ([[Bal du moulin de la Galette]])'', 1876, [[Musée d'Orsay]], one of Impressionism's most celebrated masterpieces.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AXdOAAAAYAAJ |editor1-first=Ingo F. |editor1-last=Walther |title=Masterpieces of Western Art: A History of Art in 900 Individual Studies from the Gothic to the Present Day, Part 1 |edition=Centralibros Hispania Edicion y Distribucion, S.A. |date=1999 |publisher=Taschen |isbn=3-8228-7031-5 }}</ref>]]Impressionism emerged in France at the same time that a number of other painters, including the Italian artists known as the [[Macchiaioli]], and [[Winslow Homer]] in the United States, were also exploring ''[[En plein air|plein-air]]'' painting. The Impressionists, however, developed new techniques specific to the style. Encompassing what its adherents argued was a different way of seeing, it is an art of immediacy and movement, of candid poses and compositions, of the play of light expressed in a bright and varied use of colour.<ref name="Seiberling" /> In 1876, the poet and critic [[Stéphane Mallarmé]] said of the new style: "The represented subject, being composed of a harmony of reflected and ever-changing lights, cannot be supposed always to look the same but palpitates with movement, light, and life".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hook |first=Philip |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h-vq5phx00AC&pg=PT5 |title=The Ultimate Trophy: How The Impressionist Painting Conquered The World |date=2012-12-17 |publisher=Prestel Verlag |isbn=978-3-641-08955-9 |language=de}}</ref>

In the early 1860s, four young painters—[[Claude Monet]], [[Pierre-Auguste Renoir]], [[Alfred Sisley]], and [[Frédéric Bazille]]—met while studying under the academic artist [[Marc-Charles-Gabriel Gleyre|Charles Gleyre]]. They discovered that they shared an interest in painting landscape and contemporary life rather than historical or mythological scenes. Following a practice—pioneered by artists such as the Englishman [[John Constable]]—<ref>{{Cite web |last=Tate |title=Impressionism |url=https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/i/impressionism |access-date=2022-09-30 |website=Tate |language=en-GB |archive-date=30 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220930190904/https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/i/impressionism |url-status=live }}</ref> that had become increasingly popular by mid-century, they often ventured into the countryside together to paint in the open air.<ref>{{cite book |last1=White |first1=Harrison C. |first2=Cynthia A. |last2=White |year=1993 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2D_ehhO_14QC&pg=PA116 |title=Canvases and Careers: Institutional Change in the French Painting World |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221112131900/https://books.google.com/books?id=2D_ehhO_14QC&pg=PA116 |archive-date=12 November 2022 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |page=116 |isbn=0-226-89487-8 }}.</ref> Their purpose was not to make sketches to be developed into carefully finished works in the studio, as was the usual custom, but to complete their paintings out-of-doors.{{sfnp|Bomford|Kirby|Leighton|Roy|1990|pp=21–27}}

By painting in sunlight directly from nature, and making bold use of the vivid synthetic pigments that had become available since the beginning of the century, they began to develop a lighter and brighter manner of painting that extended further the [[Realism (art movement)|Realism]] of Courbet and the [[Barbizon school]]. A favourite meeting place for the artists was the [[Café Guerbois]] on Avenue de Clichy in Paris, where the discussions were often led by [[Édouard Manet]], whom the younger artists greatly admired. They were soon joined by [[Camille Pissarro]], [[Paul Cézanne]], and [[Armand Guillaumin]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Greenspan |first1=Taube G |chapter=Armand Guillaumin |title=Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online |publisher=Oxford University Press }}</ref>

Artists' petitions requesting a new Salon des Refusés in 1867, and again in 1872, were denied. In December 1873, [[Claude Monet|Monet]], [[Pierre-Auguste Renoir|Renoir]], [[Camille Pissarro|Pissarro]], [[Alfred Sisley|Sisley]], [[Paul Cézanne|Cézanne]], [[Berthe Morisot]], [[Edgar Degas]] and several other artists founded the {{lang|fr|[[Batignolles group#Society_of_Artists,_Painters,_Sculptors_and_Etchers|Société anonyme des artistes peintres, sculpteurs, graveurs, etc.]]}}{{efn|name="societe-anonyme"|English: "Anonymous Society of painters, sculptors, engravers, etc."}} to exhibit their artworks independently.{{sfnp|Bomford|Kirby|Leighton|Roy|1990|p=209}}{{sfnp|Moffett|1986|page=18}} Members of the association were expected to forswear participation in the Salon.{{sfnp|Jensen|1994|p=90}} The organizers invited a number of other progressive artists to join them in their inaugural exhibition, including the older [[Eugène Boudin]], whose example had first persuaded Monet to adopt ''plein air'' painting years before.{{sfnp|Denvir|1990|p=32}} Another painter who greatly influenced Monet and his friends, [[Johan Jongkind]], declined to participate, as did Édouard Manet. In total, thirty artists participated in their first exhibition, held in April 1874 at the studio of the photographer [[Nadar (photographer)|Nadar]].

Among the artists of the core group (minus Bazille, who had died in the [[Franco-Prussian War]] in 1870), defections occurred as Cézanne, followed later by Renoir, Sisley, and Monet, abstained from the group exhibitions so they could submit their works to the Salon. Disagreements arose from issues such as Guillaumin's membership in the group, championed by Pissarro and Cézanne against opposition from Monet and Degas, who thought him unworthy.{{sfn|Denvir|1990|p=105}} Degas invited [[Mary Cassatt]] to display her work in the 1879 exhibition, but also insisted on the inclusion of [[Jean-François Raffaëlli]], [[Ludovic-Napoléon Lepic|Ludovic Lepic]], and other realists who did not represent Impressionist practices, causing Monet in 1880 to accuse the Impressionists of "opening doors to first-come daubers".{{sfnp|Rewald|1973|p=603}}

In this regard, the seventh Paris Impressionist exhibition in 1882 was the most selective of all including the works of only nine "true" impressionists, namely [[Gustave Caillebotte]], [[Paul Gauguin]], [[Armand Guillaumin]], [[Claude Monet]], [[Berthe Morisot]], [[Camille Pissarro]], [[Pierre-Auguste Renoir]], [[Alfred Sisley]], and [[Victor Vignon]]. The group then divided again over the invitations to [[Paul Signac]] and [[Georges Seurat]] to exhibit with them at the 8th Impressionist exhibition in 1886. Pissarro was the only artist to show at all eight Paris Impressionist exhibitions.

* In paintings made ''[[en plein air]]'' (outdoors), shadows are boldly painted with the blue of the sky as it is reflected onto surfaces, giving a sense of freshness previously not represented in painting. (Blue shadows on snow inspired the technique.)

The Impressionists reacted to modernity by exploring "a wide range of non-academic subjects in art" such as middle-class leisure activities and "urban themes, including train stations, cafés, brothels, the theater, and dance."<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Poulet |editor1-first=Anne L. |last1=Murphy |first1=Alexandra R. |year=1979 |title=Corot to Braque: French Paintings from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston |location=Boston |publisher=The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston |page=XV |isbn=0-87846-134-5}}</ref> They found inspiration in the [[Haussmann's renovation of Paris|newly widened avenues]] of Paris, bounded by new tall buildings that offered opportunities to depict bustling crowds, popular entertainments, and nocturnal lighting in artificially closed-off spaces.{{sfnp|Huyghe|1973|pp=54, 77, 121}} A painting such as Caillebotte's ''[[Paris Street; Rainy Day]]'' (1877) strikes a modern note by emphasizing the isolation of individuals amid the outsized buildings and spaces of the urban environment.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Varnedoe |first1=Kirk |year=1987 |title=Gustave Caillebotte |publisher=Yale University Press |page=90 |isbn=9780300037227}}</ref> When painting landscapes, the Impressionists did not hesitate to include the factories that were proliferating in the countryside. Earlier painters of landscapes had conventionally avoided smokestacks and other signs of industrialization, regarding them as blights on nature's order and unworthy of art.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Rubin |first1=James Henry |year=2008 |title=Impressionism and the Modern Landscape: Productivity Technology and Urbanization from Manet to Van Gogh |location=Berkeley |publisher=University of California Press |page=128 |isbn=9780520248014}}</ref>

Prior to the Impressionists, other painters, notably such [[Dutch Golden Age painting|17th-century Dutch painters]] as [[Jan Steen]], had emphasized common subjects, but their methods of [[composition (visual arts)|composition]] were traditional. They arranged their compositions so that the main subject commanded the viewer's attention. [[J. M. W. Turner]], while an artist of the [[Romanticism|Romantic era]], anticipated the style of impressionism with his artwork.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/J-M-W-Turner |website=Britannica.com |title=J.M.W. Turner |access-date=8 December 2018 |archive-date=30 January 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100130101931/http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/610274/J-M-W-Turner |url-status=live }}</ref> The Impressionists relaxed the boundary between subject and background so that the effect of an Impressionist painting often resembles a snapshot, a part of a larger reality captured as if by chance.{{sfnp|Rosenblum|1989|p=228}} Photography was gaining popularity, and as cameras became more portable, photographs became more candid. Photography inspired Impressionists to represent momentary action, not only in the fleeting lights of a landscape, but in the day-to-day lives of people.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Varnedoe |first1=J. Kirk T. |title=The Artifice of Candor: Impressionism and Photography Reconsidered |journal=Art in America |volume=68 |issue=1 |date=January 1980 |pages=66–78}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Herbert |first1=Robert L. |title=Impressionism: Art, Leisure, and Parisian Society |publisher=Yale University Press |year=1988 |pages=311, 319 |isbn=0-300-05083-6}}</ref>

[[File:Berthe Morisot The Harbor at Lorient.jpg|thumb|left|[[Berthe Morisot]], ''[[The Harbor at Lorient]]'', 1869, [[National Gallery of Art]], Washington, D.C.]]

Impressionists, in varying degrees, were looking for ways to depict visual experience and contemporary subjects.{{sfnp|Garb|1986|p=9}} Female Impressionists were interested in these same ideals but had many social and career limitations compared to male Impressionists. They were particularly excluded from the imagery of the bourgeois social sphere of the boulevard, cafe, and dance hall.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Women, art, and society|last=Chadwick|first=Whitney|publisher=Thames & Hudson|year=2012|isbn=978-0-500-20405-4|edition=Fifth|location=London|page=232|oclc=792747353}}</ref> As well as imagery, women were excluded from the formative discussions that resulted in meetings in those places;. thatThat was where male Impressionists were able to form and share ideas about Impressionism.<ref name=":0" /> In the academic realm, women were believed to be incapable of handling complex subjects, which led teachers to restrict what they taught female students.{{sfnp|Garb|1986|p=6}} It was also considered unladylike to excel in art, since women's true talents were then believed to center on homemaking and mothering.{{sfnp|Garb|1986|p=6}}

The critics of the time lumped these four together without regard to their personal styles, techniques, or subject matter.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Berthe Morisot: Woman Impressionist|last=Kang|first=Cindy|publisher=Rizzoli Electra|year=2018|isbn=978-0-8478-6131-6|location=New York, NY|page=31|oclc=1027042476}}</ref> Critics viewing their works at the exhibitions often attempted to acknowledge the women artists' talents but circumscribed them within a limited notion of femininity.{{sfnp|Garb|1986|p=36}} Arguing for the suitability of Impressionist technique to women's manner of perception, Parisian critic S.C. de Soissons wrote:<blockquote>One can understand that women have no originality of thought, and that literature and music have no feminine character; but surely women know how to observe, and what they see is quite different from that which men see, and the art which they put in their gestures, in their toilet, in the decoration of their environment is sufficient to give is the idea of an instinctive, of a peculiar genius which resides in each one of them.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Adler |first1=Kathleen |title=Perspectives on Morisot |date=1990 |publisher=Hudson Hills Press |location=New York |isbn=1-55595-049-3 |page=60 |edition=1st |url=https://primo.lib.umn.edu/primo-explore/fulldisplay?docid=UMN_ALMA21430754870001701&context=L&vid=MORRIS&search_scope=Primocentral&tab=primocentral&lang=en_US |access-date=28 April 2019 |archive-date=25 February 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225171013/https://primo.lib.umn.edu/primo-explore/fulldisplay?docid=UMN_ALMA21430754870001701&context=L&vid=MORRIS&search_scope=Primocentral&tab=primocentral&lang=en_US |url-status=live }}</ref></blockquote>While Impressionism legitimized the domestic social life as subject matter, of which women had intimate knowledge, it also tended to limit them to that subject matter. Portrayals of often-identifiable sitters in domestic settings (which could offer commissions) were dominant in the exhibitions.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Women Artists in Paris, 1850–1900|last1=Laurence|first1=Madeline|last2=Kendall|first2=Richard|publisher=Yale University Press|year=2017|isbn=978-0-300-22393-4|location=New York, New York|page=49|chapter=Women Artists and Impressionism|oclc=982652244}}</ref> The subjects of the paintings were often women interacting with their environment by either their gaze or movement. Cassatt, in particular, was aware of her placement of subjects: she kept her predominantly female figures from objectification and cliche; when they are not reading, they converse, sew, drink tea, and when they are inactive, they seem lost in thought.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Mary Cassatt, Modern Woman|last=Barter|first=Judith A.|publisher=Art Institute of Chicago in association with H.N. Abrams|year=1998|isbn=0-8109-4089-2|edition=1st|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/marycassattmoder0000cass/page/63 63]|oclc=38966030|url=https://archive.org/details/marycassattmoder0000cass/page/63}}</ref>

TheWhile womenImpressionism Impressionists,legitimized likethe theirdomestic malesocial counterpartslife as subject matter, wereof strivingwhich forwomen "truth"had intimate knowledge, forit newalso waystended to limit them to that subject matter. Portrayals of seeingoften-identifiable andsitters newin paintingdomestic techniques;settings, eachwhich artistcould hadoffer ancommissions, individualwere paintingdominant in the styleexhibitions.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Women ImpressionistsArtists in Paris, 1850–1900|lastlast1=PfeifferLaurence|firstfirst1=IngridMadeline|last2=Kendall|first2=Richard|publisher=SchirnYale KunsthalleUniversity FrankfurtPress|year=20082017|isbn=978-30-7757300-207922393-34|location=FrankfurtNew amYork, MainNew York|page=2249|chapter=ImpressionismWomen Is Feminine: On the Reception of Morisot, Cassatt, Gonzalès,Artists and BracquemondImpressionism|oclc=183262558982652244}}</ref> WomenThe Impressionistssubjects (particularlyof Morisotthe andpaintings were often women interacting with their environment by either their gaze or movement. Cassatt), werein particular, was consciousaware of theher balanceplacement of powersubjects: betweenshe womenkept andher objectspredominantly infemale theirfigures paintingsfrom –objectification theand bourgeoiscliche; womenwhen depictedthey are not definedreading, bythey decorativeconverse, objectssew, butdrink insteadtea, interactand withwhen andthey dominateare theinactive, thingsthey withseem whichlost theyin livethought.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Mary Cassatt, Modern Woman|last=Barter|first=Judith A.|publisher=Art Institute of Chicago in association with H.N. Abrams|year=1998|isbn=0-8109-4089-2|edition=1st|location=New York|pages=[https://archive.org/details/marycassattmoder0000cass/page/6563 6563]|oclc=38966030|url=https://archive.org/details/marycassattmoder0000cass/page/6563}}</ref> There are many similarities in their depictions of women who seem both at ease and subtly confined.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Meyers|first=Jeffery|date=September 2008|title=Longing and Constraint|journal=Apollo|volume=168|page=128|via=ProQuest LLC}}</ref> Gonzalès' ''Box at the Italian Opera'' depicts a woman staring into the distance, at ease in a social sphere but confined by the box and the man standing next to her. Cassatt's painting ''Young Girl at a Window'' is brighter in color but remains constrained by the canvas edge as she looks out the window.

Despite their success in their ability to have a career and Impressionism's demise attributed to its allegedly feminine characteristics (itscharacteristics—its sensuality, dependence on sensation, physicality, and fluidity) thefluidity—the four women artists, (and other, lesser-known women Impressionists), were largely omitted from art historical textbooks covering Impressionist artists until Tamar Garb's ''Women Impressionists'' published in 1986.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Perspectives on Morisot|last=Adler|first=Kathleen|publisher=Hudson Hills Press|others=Edelstein, T. J., Mount Holyoke College. Art Museum.|year=1990|isbn=1-55595-049-3|edition=1st|location=New York|page=57|oclc=21764484}}</ref> For example, ''Impressionism'' by Jean Leymarie, published in 1955 included no information on any women Impressionists.

* [[Édouard Manet]] (1832–1883), who did not participate in any of the Impressionist exhibitions<ref>{{cite book |last1=Cole |first1=Bruce |year=1991 |title=Art of the Western World: From Ancient Greece to Post Modernism |publisher=Simon and Schuster |page=242 |ISBNisbn=0-671-74728-2}}</ref>

There were several other close associates of the Impressionists who adopted their methods to some degree. These include [[Jean-Louis Forain]], (who participated in Impressionist exhibitions in 1879, 1880, 1881 and 1886),<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.culture.gouv.fr/documentation/joconde/fr/decouvrir/expositions/impressionnisme/theme_imprart.htm|title=Joconde : catalogue collectif des collections des musées de France|website=www.culture.gouv.fr|access-date=2017-12-28|archive-date=28 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171228172700/http://www.culture.gouv.fr/documentation/joconde/fr/decouvrir/expositions/impressionnisme/theme_imprart.htm|url-status=dead|lang=French}}</ref> and [[Giuseppe De Nittis]], an Italian artist living in Paris who participated in the first Impressionist exhibit at the invitation of Degas, although the other Impressionists disparaged his work.{{sfnp|Denvir|1990|p=152}} [[Federico Zandomeneghi]] was another Italian friend of Degas who showed with the Impressionists. [[Eva Gonzalès]] was a follower of Manet who did not exhibit with the group.

[[James Abbott McNeill Whistler]] was an American-born painter who played a part in Impressionism although he did not join the group and preferred grayed colours. [[Walter Sickert]], an English artist, was initially a follower of Whistler, and later an important disciple of Degas;. heHe did not exhibit with the Impressionists. In 1904, the artist and writer [[Wynford Dewhurst]] wrote the first important study of the French painters published in English, ''Impressionist Painting: its genesis and development'', which did much to popularize Impressionism in Great Britain.

* The [[Slovenian Impressionism|Slovenian Impressionists]], [[Ivan Grohar]], [[Rihard Jakopič]], [[Matija Jama]], and [[Matej Sternen]], Impressionists from Slovenia. Their beginning was in the school of [[Anton Ažbe]] in Munich and they were influenced by [[Jurij Šubic]] and [[Ivana Kobilca]], Slovenian painters working in Paris.

* [[Laura Muntz Lyall]], aand [[Helen McNicoll]], Canadian artistartists

The influence of visual Impressionism on its musical counterpart is debatable. [[Claude Debussy]] and [[Maurice Ravel]] are generally considered the greatest Impressionist composers, but Debussy disavowed the term, calling it the invention of critics. [[Erik Satie]] was also considered in this category, though his approach was regarded as less serious, more musical novelty in nature.

[[Paul Dukas]] is another French composer sometimes considered an Impressionist, but his style is perhaps more closely aligned to the late Romanticists. Musical Impressionism beyond France includes the work of such composers as [[Ottorino Respighi]] (Italy), [[Ralph Vaughan Williams]], [[Cyril Scott]], and [[John Ireland (composer)|John Ireland]] (England), [[Manuel De Falla]] and [[Isaac Albeniz]] (Spain), and [[Charles Griffes]] (America).

The term Impressionism has also been used to describe works of literature in which a few select details suffice to convey the sensory impressions of an incident or scene. Impressionist literature is closely related to [[Symbolism (arts)|Symbolism]], with its major exemplars being [[Charles Baudelaire|Baudelaire]], [[Stéphane Mallarmé|Mallarmé]], [[Arthur Rimbaud|Rimbaud]], and [[Paul Verlaine|Verlaine]]. Authors such as [[Virginia Woolf]], [[D.H. Lawrence]], [[Henry James]], and [[Joseph Conrad]] have written works that are Impressionistic in the way that they describe, rather than interpret, the impressions, sensations and emotions that constitute a character's mental life. Some literary scholars, such as John G. Peters, believe literary Impressionism is better defined by its philosophical stance than by any supposed relationship with Impressionist painting.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Berrong |first=Richard M. |date=2006-06-01 |title=Modes of Literary Impressionism |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00166928-39-2-203 |journal=Genre |volume=39 |issue=2 |pages=203–228 |doi=10.1215/00166928-39-2-203 |issn=0016-6928}}</ref>

During the 1880s several artists began to develop different preceptsPost-Impressionism forprefigured the usecharacteristics of colour, pattern, form, and line, derived from the Impressionist example: [[Vincent van GoghFuturism]], and [[Paul GauguinCubism]], [[Georgesreflecting Seurat]],the andchange [[Henriof deattitude Toulouse-Lautrec]]towards art in European society.<ref>{{Cite Thesebook artists|url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781032699707/post-impressionists-england-barrie-bullen were|title=Post-Impressionists slightlyin youngerEngland: thanThe theCritical Impressionists,Reception and|date=2024-03-08 their|publisher=Routledge work|isbn=978-1-032-69970-7 is|editor-last=Bullen known|editor-first=Barrie as|location=London post-Impressionism|doi=10.4324/9781032699707}}</ref> Some of the original Impressionist artists also ventured into this new territory; [[Camille Pissarro]] briefly painted in a [[Pointillism|pointillist]] manner, and even Monet abandoned strict ''plein air'' painting. [[Paul Cézanne]], who participated in the first and third Impressionist exhibitions, developed a highly individual vision emphasising pictorial structure, and he is more often called a post-Impressionist. Although these cases illustrate the difficulty of assigning labels, the work of the original Impressionist painters may, by definition, be categorised as Impressionism.