Why is the public laughing at the impressionists known today?

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Today, impressionism is the most popular artistic direction. But when the Impressionists tried to settle in Paris in the 1860s and 1870s, things were very different. They were despised, scoffed at, and their works were often exhibited for the amusement of the public, who did not spare sharp remarks about the artists.

1. Breakfast of the rowers, Renoir

Rowers' Breakfast is a classic Renoir: modern, showing people enjoying themselves, with fluid brush strokes and finished in the rich and glossy style that Renoir is familiar with. Renoir loved the boat lake north of Chateau Croissy. This place was next to the Fournaise Hotel, where Renoir looked after his wife Alina and where they often returned in the summer. The painting is completely impressionistic: it depicts a modern scene, modern clothes and does not seek to convey any moral message. It's just about people having fun on Sunday afternoons.

However, this was consistent with the general philosophy of Renoir's painting. As he said: Alina is depicted in the foreground with a dog on her knees. She talks to a group of people, including the impressionist painters Gustave Caillebotte and Mary Cassatt. The painting is particularly impressive in that it combines three genres into one: portrait, still life (fruit on the table), and landscape (lush foliage in the background).

But while Renoir's personal life was in perfect order, his career was still hanging in the balance of doubts. Like other Impressionists, he could not find regular buyers for his work and in the summer of 1881 went through a crisis that led him to the so-called dry period (he worried that he was stagnating and wondered if he should lead a new artistic direction). Indeed, he often paid for food and lodging at Fournaise by donating paintings. The Rowers' Breakfast was presented at the Seventh Impressionist Exhibition, held in 1882. He even received compliments in return from a number of other hostile critics. They included Armand Sylvester's commentary that it was one of the best paintings “produced by this rebellious work of independent artists” and Albert Wolfe's caustic remark that “if Renoir really learned to paint, then he might have a beautiful painting..

2. Bar at Folies Bergeres, Manet

By 1882, Manet was dying of tertiary syphilis. But he continued to strive to paint and exhibit his work in the official Salon of Fine Arts, where he finally achieved success last year (receiving a second class medal for a painting by the aristocrat Henri Rochefort). This was important and meant that Manet could exhibit his work without the consent of a hostile jury.

The Bar at the Folies Bergère was one of two works that he presented in 1882. The painting represents one of the most breathtaking places in Manet's beloved Paris - at the Folies Bergère. The work is thoroughly modern (demonstration of electric lighting, beer bottles from England and imported tangerines) - all this and much more is an integral part of this work.

This picture, like many of Manet's works, is mysterious. A woman named Suzon looks at the viewer distantly, seemingly lost in her own thoughts. She is modestly dressed in many ways, but she wears a very distinctive black necklace. Despite his pronounced calmness, Suzon appears to be having a lively discussion with the gentleman in the top hat. It's hard to tell if they are talking about drinks or something much more serious. And then the question arises, who is this mysterious man: patron, lover or father Suzon?

Most important, however, is the curious use of reflection. The bar clearly has a large mirror behind it. But Mane is deliberately playing with reflection to give us a good overview of Suzon's back and the person she is talking to. The result puzzled contemporaries and is puzzling to this day. An interesting fact is that Manet was too ill to paint at the Folies Bergeres, so Suzon came to his studio to pose behind a specially designed bar.

3. The Card Players, Cezanne

Cezanne is best known for his five-piece series The Card Players. One of the paintings set a world price record: in 2011 it was sold for almost two hundred and sixty million dollars. Paul Cezanne was a difficult person. Born in Aix-en-Provence in the south of France, he fought for many years to escape from his domineering father. He was very hot-tempered, and much of his early work was rather disturbing (it even includes murder paintings).

But with the support of Pissarro, he was introduced into the bosom of the Impressionists and exhibited in two of their eight independent exhibitions, although he caused conflicting reviews with his work. For example, one critic, having seen "Modern Olympia", wrote that Cezanne is a man with a capital letter, "a kind of madman who writes in a state of delirium tremens." By the 1890s, Cézanne had estranged himself from his wife and best friend Émile Zola and was almost completely devoted to his art.

Cézanne's Card Players series depicts local Provencal farm laborers focusing on their card games. Two pictures show three card players, the rest - only two. The players sit still and seem completely detached from each other. The proportions of many players seem strange: look at small heads, long arms and large bodies, and pipes and hats are very different from each other (Cezanne's father had a hat business before he became a banker). Plus, blue, Cézanne's favorite color, is visible in all but one of his paintings. Paul completed a lot of research before he managed to paint five of these paintings, one of which (the final version) is in a private collection bought by the Qatari royal family for a world record $ 259 million in 2011.

4. Boulevard Montmatre, Pissarro

Pissarro is perhaps not the most famous impressionist. But he was the very main link that held the Impressionist movement together. Born in the Danish West Indies (now the US Virgin Islands) in 1830, Camille Pissarro was one of the main members of the Impressionist group. He was instrumental in organizing the first independent Impressionist exhibition in 1874, and his friendly and laid-back approach to life allowed him to mediate difficult personalities such as Degas and Cézanne.

In 1897, Pissarro rented a room at the Hotel de Russy and produced a series of twelve paintings depicting the Boulevard Montmatre at different times of the day and at different times of the year. Only one of the paintings depicts a night road. Using rather crude brushstrokes and bold colors, Camille has created a stunning work that depicts the bright lights of shops, theaters, gas lanterns and taxis on a wet Parisian evening. Pissarro even catches the reflection of bright lights against a dark sky, an early example of tenebrism. And his daytime scenes are no less remarkable for their variety. The gaze clings to the busy street on a cloudy spring morning and a warm sunset when the trees are blooming.

5. Water lilies, Monet

Monet is the most famous impressionist today, famous for his "Water Lilies". In total, the series includes more than two hundred and fifty paintings created in the last thirty years of Monet's life. Monet moved to Giverny, a small town near Paris, in 1883 (the year of Manet's death). To begin with, he rented a large farmhouse, buying it about ten years later, as his work grew in popularity and value, and then, in the early 1890s, he acquired a plot of land near the house and began to turn it into a water garden. He later hired a gardener to look after the ponds and lilies on a permanent basis.

Giverny was where Monet continued to paint with remarkable zeal until his death. For thirty years, starting in the mid-1890s, Monet mainly painted water lilies. This was perhaps his most complete series of paintings (he also painted many versions of haystacks, poplars, Rouen Cathedral and the Houses of Parliament), and it is not surprising that the series of these works is so powerful, leaving a lasting impression. No one has ever used color, light and reflection so skillfully. In addition, there is a huge selection of paintings: paintings of a pond, a Japanese bridge that Monet installed in 1906, and extreme close-ups of a handful of lilies. Some of the canvases are huge, especially those that are now in the Orangerie Museum in Paris.

Monet continued to paint Water Lilies, despite the fact that his vision had been impaired by cataracts since about 1908 (he eventually agreed to surgically remove it). During his cataract years, Monet used much more reds and oranges. Monet was the longest-lived of the Impressionists: he outlived Manet by more than four decades, and Renoir by seven years. He wrote Water Lilies until his death in December 1926.

And variants of paintings from the series "Water Lilies" can be seen all over the world. The National Gallery in London and the Musée d'Orsay in Paris have their own versions. The same can be said for the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Washington National Gallery and the Tokyo National Gallery of Western Art. The Paris Orangery Museum was specially built under the strict instructions of Monet to preserve his legacy of twelve huge "Water Lilies".

Read also about what is interesting about ten legendary paintings by Raphael.