IMPRESSIONISM

Nicolás Dobre & Javier Calvo

WHAT IMPRESSIONISM IS?
The Impressionism is a pictorial movement that develops in France during the second half of the XIX
century because social movements begin and economic expansion in Europe grows. Reality is portrayed as
it appears, interest in nature arises and they move away from the imagination and the fantastic.
On April 15 of 1874, a group of young artists (Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, Degas and many others) exhibited
their works in the studio of the photographer Nadar. The journalist Louis Leroy described the exhibition
as Impressionist, applying the name of Monet's work “impression soleil levant”.
The word impression was used to define the sketchy and unfinished quality of an artist's work and also to
define the visual impact the artist received when commenting on the subject of a painting.

MONET PISSARRO RENOIR DEGAS

CHARACTERISTICS
- Concern about the changing effect of light on the surface of natural objects, especially moving ones like
water.
- Study of the effects of light on objects in a scientific way.
- Representation of shadows with a multitude of shades of color that include those complementary to the
object that projects it.
- They leave the workshop. They paint outside
- Analysis of the color of nature under the changing light. Study of the composition of colors.
- Fragmented brushwork and juxtaposition of pure colors that mix on the viewer's retina.
- Subjectivity of the artist and the spectator who is the one who mixes the brushstrokes on the retina.
- Space and volume conventions are maintained.
- Subjects of daily life painted naturally in an instant.
INFLUENCES
Impressionism received influences from various sources, among which can be highlighted:
- The realist movement emerged in France in the mid-nineteenth century. Realist artists wanted to reflect
contemporary reality, especially that of the urban and rural working classes.
- Outdoor painting had already been postulated by the artists of the Barbizon School, a group sympathetic
to realism that settled near the Fontainebleau forest. These artists, who devoted themselves almost
exclusively to the painting of natural landscapes, took their sketches in the open air.
- The color treatment of earlier artists such as Eugene Delacroix, William Turner, Diego Velázquez and
Francisco Goya.
- The theories on the effects of color of Eugene Chevreul and Charles Blanc, who studied the phenomena
related to light and color, the influence of colors on each other and the relationships between primary,
secondary and their complements.
MONET
Claude Monet was one of the founders of Impressionism and
the only one of the group who continued Impressionist
research until the end of his life.
He explored the effects of light and color on objects in
numerous series of paintings on the same subject, but at
different times. His work is true to visual impression and he
made series of works on the same theme to capture the
changing effects of light and color at different times and
seasons. He was interested in the landscape more than the LES
representation of people. His brushstrokes are stains of color, NYMPHÉAS
anticipating abstraction.
He lived for a time in London where he was influenced by the
works of Turner. In 1872 he painted the impression of sunrise
that would give the Impressionist movement its name and in
1893 he began to paint Les nymphéas which is a cycle of oil
paintings.
San Giorgio Maggiore At Dusk (1908-1912)
Also known occasionally as Sunset in
Venice, it was painted in the fall of 1908
in Venice, where Monet and his wife
Alice had traveled in their own
chauffeured car. They stayed first at the
Palazzo Barbaro and then at the Hotel
Brittania. It was here that he created this
masterpiece.
The period in which Monet created this
river or seascape painting was when he
began to lose his sight due to gray
cataracts. Monet used the vibrant colors
blue, yellow, and red to represent the
sunset. Across the lagoon we see Venice
Well, a famous island church in Venice,
Italy.
RENOI
R Pierre-Auguste Renoir, who was born in Limoges and
was the son of a poor tailor, was one of the painters of
the Impressionist group, focused, unlike most of his
landscape colleagues, on the human figure.
Specifically, in the nude female human figure. It also
reproduced qualities and textures of clothes and
objects.
At the age of 13, he was already working as a porcelain
painter in Paris. In 1861 he met Monet and Sisley who
influenced him artistically. He made use of pastel
tones, qualities and textures influenced by his craft as
a porcelain decorator.
After visiting Italy he was influenced by the great
masters and they took him away from the main
current of impressionism. This caused that at the end
of his days he approached Fauvism and Matisse.
Bal du moulin de la Galette (1876)
This is Renoir's most important work in the mid-
1870s, it was presented at the Impressionist
group exhibition of 1877. Although the painter
stopped representing some of his friends, he
strove above all to reflect the vehement and
joyful atmosphere from this popular
establishment on the Butte Montmartre. The
study of the moving crowd under both natural
and artificial light is treated through vibrant and
colored brushstrokes. The feeling that the forms
are diluted was one of the causes of the negative
reactions of the critics of the time.
Because of its theme rooted in contemporary
Parisian life, its innovative style and also its
imposing format, a sign of the ambition of
Renoir's approach, this painting constitutes one
of the masterpieces of early Impressionism.