CLAUDE MONET

(1840–1926)

Contents
The Highlights
LUNCHEON ON THE GRASS
SELF PORTRAIT WITH A BERET
THE TERRACE AT SAINTE-ADRESSE
WOMEN IN THE GARDEN
BATHERS-AT-LA-GRENOUILLÈRE
ON THE BANK OF THE SEINE, BENNECOURT
THE MAGPIE
POPPIES BLOOMING
WOMAN WITH A PARASOL
IMPRESSION, SUNRISE
GARE SAINT LAZARE, ARRIVAL OF A TRAIN
IN THE WOODS AT GIVERNY BLANCHE HOSCHEDÉ
HAYSTACKS, (SUNSET)
ROUEN CATHEDRAL, FAÇADE (SUNSET)
BRIDGE OVER A POND OF WATER LILIES
HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT, LONDON
WATER LILIES
THE GRAND CANAL, VENICE
NYMPHEAS
THE ROSE-WAY IN GIVERNY
 The Paintings
THE PAINTINGS IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
ALPHABETICAL LIST OF PAINTINGS
The Biography
THE FRENCH IMPRESSIONISTS by Camille Mauclair

© Delphi Classics 2012

Version 1
MASTERS OF ART
CLAUDE MONET

By Delphi Classics, 2012

 The Highlights

Monet was born on the fifth floor of 45 rue Laffitte, in the 9th arrondissement of Paris
 THE HIGHLIGHTS

In this section, a sample of some of Monet’s most celebrated works are provided, with concise
introductions, special ‘detail’ reproductions and additional biographical images.
Claude Monet and his wife Camille Doncieux Monet, c.1860
 LUNCHEON ON THE GRASS

This painting, which Monet completed in 1865 at the age of 25, is now
considered by many to be his first youthful masterpiece. Heavily
inspired by Édouard Manet’s 1863 painting Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe,
which caused great scandal in the Parisian art world, Monet’s painting
portrays a similar scene. Five well-to-do Parisians are enjoying the
summer weather in the shade of a light-hearted picnic, located in the
Fontainebleau Forest, just outside of Paris. The experimental use of
light, shadows and the blurring of natural shapes, such as the leaves,
have been identified as precursors to Impressionism, which would later
infuse the artist’s work.
Monet had hoped the painting would achieve recognition at the Paris
Salon, as Manet had done in his previous work. However, due to
financial difficulties, which would go on to plague him throughout his
younger years as an artist, Monet had to sell the painting to a creditor,
who kept it locked up and unseen in a cellar for many years.
Detail
Detail
Detail
‘Le déjeuner sur l’herbe’ by Édouard Manet, 1863
The Forest of Fontainebleau, where Monet worked on this painting
‘Forest of Fontainebleau’ by Paul Cézanne, 1892
 SELF PORTRAIT WITH A BERET

Now privately owned, this painting was completed by 1886 and is the
first known self-portrait of the artist. In the painting, Monet gazes
directly at the viewer, exhibiting his confidence in his art, as well as his
personality, in a pose which is evocative of the great self-portrait Dutch
painter Rembrandt. The loose brushstrokes and unfinished appearance at
the corners demonstrate the artist’s advance into what would later be
termed Impressionism.
Detail
Detail
Detail
‘Self Portrait with Beret and Turned-Up Collar’, by Rembrandt, 1659
 THE TERRACE AT SAINTE-ADRESSE

This painting depicts Monet’s family in the garden of their home at

Sainte Adresse, near Le Havre. Facing a view of Honfleur on the
horizon, Monet employed rapid, separate brushwork, blended with
vibrant colour. The painting portrays Monet’s father in the foreground,
Monet’s cousin Jeanne Marguérite Lecadre at the fence; Dr. Adolphe
Lecadre, her father; and Lecadre’s other daughter, Sophie, as the woman
seated with her back to the viewer. Monet’s relations with his father were
tense at the time, owing to the family’s disapproval of his liaison with
Camille Doncieux, a model. The stiff representation of the figures and
looming dark clouds in the sky seem to hint at the difficult time Monet
had when staying with his family in the summer of 1867. Unable to see
his mistress, who just given birth to their son, and disillusioned by his art
not being recognised, Monet attempted suicide shortly after completing
the painting.
The brushwork is clearly looser than in earlier paintings, as
demonstrated by how the flowers, figures and sea are depicted, causing
many critics to label this work as a forerunner of Impressionism. The
painting is divided into three parts, including the terrace garden, the sea
and the sky, which are all counterpoised by the vertical lines of the two
flags, adding to the impressive compositional structure of the work.
The painting is now housed in the New York Metropolitan Museum of
Art, after being purchased in 1967, with special contributions given or
bequeathed by friends of the Museum.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Sainte-Adresse, today
 WOMEN IN THE GARDEN

Completed by 1867, this painting is now housed in Musée d’Orsay,

Paris. In the late 1860s, Camille Doncieux (1847–1879) modelled for
Monet on several occasions and became his favoured model, though she
also modelled for Renoir and Manet. In Women in the Garden, Camille
was the model for all four women in the composition.
Monet had high hopes for this painting, which he began working on
outdoors, having dug an open trench, allowing him to work on the upper
areas, while still remaining outside. The painting was then finished in
his studio. Nevertheless, when submitted to the fastidious Salon, the
work was rejected, although success was drawing closer.
Camille and Monet were married in 1870 and she was a loyal and
dependable wife, helping Monet battle depression and his suicide
attempt, where he had tried to down himself in the Seine. Sadly, Camille
died in her early thirties, most likely of pelvic cancer or tuberculosis.
Reportedly, Monet painted her on her death bed.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Camille Doncieux by Renoir
The Musée d’Orsay, where many Impressionist masterpieces are now housed
Inside the museum
 BATHERS-AT-LA-GRENOUILLÈRE

This painting was completed in 1869 and is identified by many critics as

Monet’s ‘breakthrough’ piece. Bathers at La Grenouillère is a bright and
colourful portrayal of the pleasures of a summer’s day, with Parisians
enjoying themselves, rendered by minimal brushstrokes. Monet went to
La Grenouillère with his friend and fellow artist Renoir to prepare
studies for Salon paintings. No longer having the financial means to
execute large paintings, he produced this small composition, using
radical thick brushwork and completing the piece outside – a technique
later to become know as en plein air, which would so characterise the
Impressionist style of painting. Bathers-at-la-Grenouillère won instant
recognition for the artist, fuelling his confidence for future works that
would challenge the Parisian art world’s pre-conceived notions of
acceptable composition.
Detail
Detail
Detail
La Grenouillère, today
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919)
 ON THE BANK OF THE SEINE,
BENNECOURT

Housed as part of the Potter Palmer Collection in The Art Institute of

Chicago, this painting was completed in 1868. It portrays Monet’s wife
Camille, peering across the Seine at the suburb of Bennecourt. The bold
use of colour, with stark contrasts of dark and light, underlines the
artist’s innovative approach; however, it is the elusive depiction of light
and reflection on the water that is the painting’s greatest
accomplishment.
Detail
Detail
Detail
 THE MAGPIE

Created during the winter of 1868 in the countryside near the commune
of Étretat in Normandy, this painting is one of approximately 140
snowscapes produced by Monet. The patron Louis Joachim Gaudibert
helped arrange a house in Étretat for Monet, Camille and their newborn
son, allowing the artist to paint in relative comfort, surrounded by his
family.
The canvas depicts a solitary black magpie perched on a wattle fence
as the light of the sun shines upon freshly fallen snow, creating blue
shadows. The painting features one of the first examples of Monet’s use
of coloured shadows, which would later become a typical device used by
the Impressionists. Monet and the Impressionists used coloured shadows
to represent the actual, changing conditions of light and shadow as seen
in nature, challenging the academic convention of painting shadows
black.
At the time of its composition, Monet’s innovative use of light and
colour led to the painting’s rejection by the Paris Salon of 1869.
However, critics now classify The Magpie as one of Monet’s greatest
achievements. The painting hangs in the Musée d’Orsay and is
considered one of the most popular paintings in their permanent
collection.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Cliffs in the commune of Étretat, Normandy, close to the setting of the painting
 POPPIES BLOOMING

Now housed at the Musee d’Orsay, this is one of several paintings by

Monet set in a poppy field. A woman and a child are seen, Camille and
their son Jean, walking towards the right foreground, in a field near
Argenteuil, where the poppies are vividly represented, making this one
of artist’s most distinctive images. Poppies blooming was painted in
1873 and effectively evokes the atmosphere of a languid summer’s day.
Monet’s brushstrokes aim to capture the changing quality of light.
After returning from England, Monet had lived in Argenteuil from
1871 to 1878. The colourful landscape of the region allowed the artist to
work en plein air, which he had already experimented with in early
works. This painting reveals how passionate Monet was about his use of
vibrant colours, as shown by the lurid blobs of red to depict the poppies,
which are scattered across lush green fields.
Detail
Detail
Detail
 WOMAN WITH A PARASOL

Completed by 1875, this painting now hangs in the National Gallery of

Art, Washington. Once more it depicts the artist’s wife Camille, holding
a parasol, while walking in a field near Argenteuil. Wistfully, she gazes
down at the viewer, establishing a stance of superiority and dominance,
whilst the much smaller figure of her son Jean also looks directly out of
the painting. Broad brushstrokes simply portray the clouds and flowers,
creating the impression of movement with the summer breeze, which
stirs Camille’s veil.
Detail
Detail
Detail
 IMPRESSION, SUNRISE

This famous painting gave rise to the name of the Impressionist

movement. Completed by 1872, it depicts the harbour of Le Havre in
France, with very loose brushstrokes that suggest an impression of the
scene, rather than a realistic delineation of the subject. Monet later
explained the purpose of the painting in a letter:
“Landscape is nothing but an impression, and an instantaneous one, hence this label that was
given us, by the way because of me. I had sent a thing done in Le Havre, from my window, sun in
the mist and a few masts of boats sticking up in the foreground....They asked me for a title for the
catalogue, it couldn’t really be taken for a view of Le Havre, and I said: ‘Put Impression.’“

Impression, Sunrise was displayed in 1874 during the first independent

art show of a group of painters that would later be known as the
Impressionists. It was critic Louis Leroy’s hostile review of the show that
encouraged the naming of the new art movement, when he titled it “The
Exhibition of the Impressionists” in Le Charivari newspaper.
The painting was stolen from the Musée Marmottan Monet in 1985.
Five masked gunmen with pistols entered the museum and stole nine
paintings from the collection. All together they were valued at $12
million. A tip-off led to the arrest in Japan of a Yakuza gangster named
Shuinichi Fujikuma, which then led to the recovery of the stolen
paintings in a small villa in Corsica in December 1990. Impression,
Sunrise has been back on display in Musée Marmottan Monet ever since.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Louis Leroy, whose hostile review inadvertently named the Impressionist art movement
Musée Marmottan Monet, rue Louis Boilly, Paris, where ‘Impression, Sunrise’ is on permanent
display
 GARE SAINT LAZARE, ARRIVAL OF A
TRAIN

Monet was keen to not only create images of the countryside, but also to
represent vivid impressions of urban life too. In 1877, the artist rented a
studio near the Gare Saint Lazare. At the time, the country was gripped
by railway frenzy, as stations were appearing in many places across the
country. One day, dressed in his best clothes, Monet visited the station.
Announcing himself as ‘Claude Monet the painter’ to the surprised train
workers, they assumed he was a great Salon artist, and immediately
cleared the station, so that he might paint undisturbed.
That same year he exhibited seven paintings of the railway station in
an Impressionist exhibition. These images demonstrated how
impressionism was a diverse style, which was not only concerned with
floral compositions, but could also be used to effectively portray a scene
of busy city life. In the following painting, Monet captures a single
moment in time, where the great clouds of billowing steam, the busy
workers and the colossal train are given a monumental appearance,
celebrating the technology of the age.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Paris Saint-Lazare, one of the six large terminus train stations of Paris and now immortalised by
the artist
 IN THE WOODS AT GIVERNY BLANCHE
HOSCHEDÉ

This painting was completed in 1887 and depicts Monet’s fellow artist
Blanche Hoschedé, who was both his stepdaughter and daughter-in-law.
Her mother, Alice Hoschedé, was the wife of a bankrupt department-
store owner. After Camille's death, she lived with Monet and eight
children in Giverny, in what was deemed at the time a highly
unconventional relationship. They were only married in 1892, when
Alice’s first husband died. Blanche was the second daughter of Alice
and she became an accomplished artist, having been trained and
encouraged by Monet.
In 1914, aged forty-nine, Blanche returned to live at Giverny. Unlike
the other women Impressionists, Blanche chose not to paint the domestic
interior, where women are depicted looking after children, sewing or
reading. Instead, Blanche chose to explore the countryside in her art,
painting landscapes and sensitive portrayals of nature.
For women artists, en plein air painting was a liberating medium. It
was a cheap and convenient option, when compared to renting a studio,
hiring a model and the academic conventions of large scale works. A
landscape painter’s equipment merely consisted of a field stool, a small
easel, a canvas umbrella and a travel box for brushes and paints and it
meant the artist could choose where and when she wished to work.
Blanche found it difficult to gain prominence in the art world due to
her gender, although she was actively supported by her father-in-law,
particularly by his respectful representation of her in his own paintings.
In the following image, Monet portrays Blanche at work, her palette in
one hand, whilst she paints with the other. Straight-backed and confident,
she works with determination. Her older sister Suzanne sits nearby,
lounging against a tree. Monet often depicted the women of his family
engaged in leisurely pursuits, but he tended to depict Blanche as being
active and painting, underlining his respect for her work.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Alice Hoschedé, Monet’s second wife
Blanche Hoschede by Monet, 1880
Monet beside Blanche
 HAYSTACKS, (SUNSET)

This painting was completed by 1891 and is now housed in the Museum
of Fine Arts, Boston. It forms part of a series of paintings depicting
stacks of hay in fields near Monet’s home in Giverny. The series
included twenty-five works and was started in the summer of 1890 and
continued through to the following spring, culminating in that year’s
harvest. Monet’s thematic use of repetition allowed him to depict subtle
differences in the perception of light across various times of day, seasons
and types of weather.
Monet had settled in Giverny in 1883 and from that time on, most of
his paintings, until his death 40 years later, portrayed scenes within two
miles of his home. The haystacks themselves were actually situated just
outside his front door. The artist was intensely fascinated by the visual
nuances of the region’s landscape and the variation in the seasons, which
he strove to depict the impression of perceiving in his work.
The haystacks depicted in this painting are from 15 to 20 foot and
functioned as storage facilities that preserved the wheat until stalk and
chaff could be more efficiently separated. The Norman method of
storing hay was to use hay as a cover to shield ears of wheat from the
elements until they could be threshed. The threshing machines traveled
from village to village. Thus, although the wheat was harvested in July it
often took until March for all the farms to be reached. These stacks
became common in the mid 19th century. This method survived for 100
years, until the inception of combine harvesters. Although shapes of
stacks were regional, it was common for them to be round in the Paris
basin and the region of Normandy in which Giverny is situated.
The Haystacks series was a financial success. Fifteen of these
paintings were exhibited by Durand-Ruel in May 1891, and every
painting sold within days, for as much as 1,000 francs. Additionally,
Monet’s prices in general began to rise steeply. As a result, he was able
to buy outright the house and grounds at Giverny and to start
constructing a water lily pond. After years of financial difficulties, he
was now able to enjoy success and live comfortably.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Monet’s home at Giverny
 ROUEN CATHEDRAL, FAÇADE (SUNSET)

This painting forms part of the Rouen Cathedral series, which depicts the
façade of the Cathédrale Notre-Dame at different times of the day and
year, reflecting changes in the edifice’s appearance under varying
conditions. Numbering more than thirty works in all, the series was
begun in 1892 and completed in Monet’s studio in 1894. The artist
rented spaces across the street from the cathedral, where he set up
temporary studios for the purpose. In 1895, he selected what he
considered to be the twenty best paintings from the series for display at
his Paris dealer’s gallery and he had sold eight of these works before the
exhibition was over. Artists Pissarro and Cézanne visited the exhibition
and praised the Rouen Cathedral series highly.
Monet was keen to explore how light imparts a distinctly different
character to a subject at different times of the day and the year, which he
made a focal point of the series. By focusing on the same subject through
a whole series of paintings, Monet was able to concentrate on recording
visual sensations themselves. The subjects did not change, but the visual
sensations, due to the mutable conditions of light, changed constantly.
In the following painting, Monet portrays the cathedral at sunset,
where the bottom half of the canvas surrenders to dubious shadows,
while the Gothic architecture above is infused with the day’s dying light,
creating a sense of doomed grandeur. The subtle interweaving of colours,
as well as Monet’s keen perception and his brilliant use of texture, all
serve to create a poignant portrayal of the twilight hour.
Detail
Detail
Rouen cathedral, 1822
The cathedral today
 BRIDGE OVER A POND OF WATER LILIES

This famous painting was completed in 1899 and is now one of the
most celebrated works in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Previously in 1893, Monet purchased land with a pond near his property
in Giverny and he began building a water-lily garden, which would
provide suitable motifs for him to include in his art. He enlisted the
services of a Japanese garden designer. Six years later, he began a series
of eighteen views of the wooden footbridge over the pond, that summer
completing twelve paintings, including the following image. The vertical
format of the composition, unusual in the rest of the series, gives
prominence to the water lilies and their myriad reflections on the pond.
Detail
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Detail
Monet, with an unidentified visitor, in his garden at Giverny, 1922
The same bridge now
 HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT, LONDON

This painting was completed in 1904 and is now housed in Musée

Marmottan Monet, Paris. Monet created a series of paintings of the
Palace of Westminster, home of the British Parliament, during his stays
in London between 1900 and 1905. The paintings all have the same size
and viewpoint from Monet’s window at St Thomas’ Hospital,
overlooking the Thames. As in Monet’s other series, these works are
painted at different times of the day and during varied weather
circumstances, capturing the subtle differences of perceiving the same
scene.
At this time Monet had abandoned his earlier working practice of
completing a painting en plein air. He would now take the canvases back
to Giverny, where he continued refining the images. Therefore he had to
send to London for photographs to help with the final preparations of the
series. Although criticised harshly by some for this process, the artist
was adamant it was ‘his own business’ how he went about his work, also
arguing it was up to the viewer to judge the final result for themselves.
Detail
Detail
Detail
St Thomas’ Hospital, where Monet painted the series
Palace of Westminster, today
 WATER LILIES

Monet’s series of Water Lilies is composed of approximately 250 oil

paintings, which depict his flower garden at Giverny. The series was the
main focus of Monet’s artistic production during the last thirty years of
his life. The majority of the works were created when the artist had very
poor eyesight, due to his suffering from cataracts, which partly explains
their enigmatic and unusual colouring.
During the 1920s, the state of France built a pair of oval rooms at the
Musée de l’Orangerie as a permanent home for eight water lily murals by
Monet. The exhibit opened to the public on 16 May 1927, a few months
after Monet’s death. Sixty water lily paintings from around the world
were assembled for a special exhibition at the Musée de l’Orangerie in
1999. Many of Monet’s water lily paintings have commanded enormous
sums of money at auctions, as they are now identified as being among
the most celebrated works of the twentieth century.
The following example is just one of the many images that comprise
this beautiful series of paintings. Housed in the Art Institute of Chicago,
it was completed by 1906 and portrays an enticing mix of water and
reflection, while flowers seem to drift peacefully in the bottom section of
the canvas.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Musée de l’Orangerie
 THE GRAND CANAL, VENICE

Painted in 1908, this painting is one Monet’s most accomplished works

to emerge from his series of paintings in Venice. Monet journeyed to the
old city in the autumn of that year. The series comprised 37 canvases,
featuring a dozen different views, taken within a short distance of each
another. This painting, now housed in Boston, depicts the famous church
Santa Maria della Salute, beside the Grand Canal, Venice’s main
waterway and an inspiration for artists over hundreds of years.
Monet was 68 when he discovered Venice. He had already been in
Italy, but no further than Bordighera on the Riviera. The opportunity
afforded by an invitation from his English friend Mary Hunter persuaded
him to make the journey. He and his second wife Alice stayed in the
Barbaro Palace on the Grand Canal.
Once he saw the city, Monet was “gripped by Venice”. After several
days looking for locations, he felt an urge to paint. According to Monet,
he believed he only delved in “trials and beginnings” in Venice.
Although the canvases were finished afterwards in his studio, they do not
have the same impasto as other works. The suite of Venetian views he
created suggest the pictures a tourist would like to bring home.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Monet with his second wife Alice, Venice, October, 1908
The Santa Maria della Salute, today
 NYMPHEAS

This painting was completed in 1915 and is housed in Neue Pinakothek,

Munich. It portrays the reflection of a willow tree, which hangs above
the water, its lush leaves merging with the water lilies. The chromatic
intensity of the blues, greens and complimentary pinks provide a rich
texture that seems to shimmer on the water’s surface.
Detail
Detail
Detail
Monet in his garden, 1917
 THE ROSE-WAY IN GIVERNY

This painting was completed in 1920 and portrays a path beneath a large
rose arch in Monet’s garden at Giverny. Being a creative project that
occupied half his life, the garden became the principal subject of his later
paintings. The following image was created when the artist was 80 years
old and demonstrates how he continued to paint with extraordinary
freedom, in spite of his failing eyesight.
The Rose-Way in Giverny offers a glorious assortment of colours,
creating an almost hypnotic effect in their abstract quality. Monet
embraced the fashionable interest in Japanese art of the time, decorating
the walls of his house with Oriental prints and building the now-famous
Japanese bridge in his garden. The influence of Japanese motifs can also
be detected in this vibrant mesh of brushstrokes. The use of thick paint
and strange combinations of colour are partly the result of his failing
eyesight, expressing a visual representation of Monet’s struggle to accept
his imminent blindness.
Fortunately, Monet had an precise memory for colours and he would
ask his stepdaughter, fellow artist Blanche, for each colour by its name
before he applied it to the canvas. In 1922, Monet had to stop his work
altogether, but in the following year he had an operation that partially
restored his sight, allowing him to continue with his art. However, his
sight now had a strange veiled quality, distorting the colours he
perceived. Sadly, he lost his eyesight completely in 1926, shortly before
his death. What he left behind, though, was one of the most
extraordinary series of paintings the world has ever seen.
Detail
Detail
Detail
The Paintings

Claude Monet, 1880

THE PAINTINGS IN CHRONOLOGICAL
ORDER

CONTENTS
1850s
1860s
1870s
1880s
1890s
1900s
1910s
1920s
Index of Paintings
1850s
 Woodgatherers at the Edge of the Forest
59.7 x 92 cm
c. 1857
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Fontainebleau Forest
50 x 65 cm
1856
Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Winterthur
 View of Rouelles
46 x 65 cm
1858
Private Collection
1860s
 Still Life with Pheasant
76 x 62.5 cm
1861
Musée des Beaux Arts de Rouen, Rouen
 Farmyard in Normandy
65 x 80 cm
c. 1861
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Still Life with Meat
24 x 32 cm
1862
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Still Life with Bottle, Bread and Wine
40.5 x 59.5 cm
1862
Private collection
 Hunting Trophy
104 x 75 cm
1862
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Farmyardnear Honfleur
38 x 46 cm
1864
Private collection
 La Chapelle de Notre-Dame-de Grace,
Honfleur
52 x 68 cm
1864
Private collection
 Towing of a Boat at Honfleur
55.5 x 82 cm
1864
Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, Rochester
 La Rue de La Bavolle at Honfleur
58 x 63 cm
1864
Stadstische Kunsthalle Mannheim , Mannheim
 Seaside at Honfleur
60 x 81 cm
1864
Los Angeles Museum of Art, Los Angeles
 Boatyard near Honfleur
57 x 81 cm
1864
Private collection
 La Pointe de la Hève
41 x 73 cm
1864
Private collection
 Road by Saint-Siméon Farm
82 x 46 cm
1864
National Museum of Western Art, Toyko
 Le Phare de l'Hospice
54 x 81 cm
1864
Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich
 The Point de la Heve
41 x 73 cm
1864
Private Collection
 Haystacks at Chailly at Sunrise
30 x 60 cm
1865
San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego
 Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
89.5 x 150.5 cm
1865
Norton Simon Foundation, Pasadena
 The Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
90 x 150 cm
1865
Norton Simon Foundation, Pasadena
 The Walk (Bazille and Camille)
93 x 69 cm
1865
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Luncheon on the Grass (centre)
248 x 217 cm
1865
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Luncheon on the Grass (left side)
418 x 150 cm
1865
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Pointe at Heve at Low Tide
90 x 150 cm
1865
Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth
 The Cart, Alley under the Snow at Honfleur
65 x 92 cm
1865
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Pavé de Chailly
43 x 59 cm
1865
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Bodmer Oak, Forest of Fontainebleau
97 x 130 cm
1865
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 Portrait of J. F. Jaxquesmart with a Parasol
105 x 61 cm
1865
Kunsthaus, Zurich
 Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre in a Garden
80 x 99 cm
1866
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 Seascape
42 x 59.5 cm
1866
Ordrupgaardsmlingen, Charlottenlund-Copenhagen
 Jar of Peaches
46 x 55.5 cm
1866
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Dresden
 Seascape, Storm
48.5 x 64.5 cm
c. 1866
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown (Mass.)
 Camille or The Woman in a Green Dress
231 x 151 cm
1866
Kunsthalle, Bremen
 Garden in Flower
65 x 54 cm
1866
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Camille with a Small Dog
73 x 54 cm
1866
Private Collection
 Unloading Coal
55 x 66 cm
1866
Private Collection
 Fishing Boats
45 x 55 cm
1866
Private collection
 Boats at Honfleur
55 x 46 cm
1866
Private collection, Zurich
 The Beach at Sainte-Adresse
75.8 x 102.5 cm
1867
Art Institute of Chigao, Chicago
 Saint-Germain-l'Auzerrois
79 x 98 cm
1867
Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kunstbesitz, Nationalgalerie, Berlin
 The Beach at Sainte-Adresse
75 x 101 cm
1867
The Art Institute, Chigao
 Terrace at Sainte-Adresse
98 x 130 cm
1867
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 The Quai at the Louvre
65 x 93 cm
1867
Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague
 Street in Sainte-Adresse
80 x 59.5 cm
1867
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute , Williamstown (Mass.)
 Taling a Walk on the Cliff at Sainte-Adresse
52 x 62 cm
1867
Matsuoka Museum of Art, Tokyo
 Sainte-Adresse
57 x 80.5 cm
1867
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Gardens of the Princess
91 x 62 cm
1867
Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College
 The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son
Jean
116.2 x 88.8 cm
1867
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 The Entrance to the Port of Honfleur
59 x 61 cm
1867
Norton Simon Foundation, Los Angeles
 Snow near Honfleur
81.5 x 102 cm
1867
Louvre, Paris
 Bonnières, Quick Sketch
1868
Private collection
 Stormy Sea at Étretat
66 x 131 cm
1868
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Jetty at La Havre
147 x 226 cm
1868
Private Collection
 Interior, after Dinner
50.2 x 65.4 cm
1868
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 River Scene at Bennecourt
81 x 100 cm
1868
Chicago Art Institute, Chicago
 Lane in Normandy
81 x 60 cm
1868
Matsuoka Museum of Art, Tokyo
 Portrait of Madame Gaudibert
217 x 138 cm
1868
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Red Mullets
33.5 x 50 cm
1869
Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge (Mass.)
 The Magpie
89 x 130 cm
c. 1869
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Bathers at Grenouillere
73 x 91 cm
1869
National Gallery of Art, London
 Infantry Guards Wandering Along the River
55 x 65 cm
1869
Private collection
 Flowers and Fruit
100 x 80 cm
1869
Getty Museum, Los Angeles
1870s
 Train in the Countryside
50 x 65 cm
1870
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Landing Stage
54 x 74 cm
1869
 Camille Sitting on the Beach at Trouville
45 x 36 cm
1870
Private Collection
 Camille on the Beach
31 x 15 cm
1870
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 Camille at the Beach at Trouville
38 x 47 cm
1870
Collection of Mrs. John Hay Whitney
 Trouville Beach
38 x 46 cm
1870
National Gallery, London
 Hôtel des Roches Noires Trouville
80 x 55 cm
1870
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Boardwalk at Trouville
52.1 x 59.1 cm
1870
Wadsworth-Atheneum Museum, Hartford
 Entrance to the Port of Trouville
54 x 66 cm
1870
Szepmuveszeti Muzeum, Budapest
 The Bridge at Bougival
63 x 91 cm
1870
Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester (N.H.)
 Green Park
34 x 72 cm
1871
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 The Port at Zaandam
47 x 74 cm
1871
Private Collection
 Canal in Zaandam
44 x 72.5 cm
1871
Private Collection
 The Port of London
49 x 74 cm
1871
National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
 Windmills Near Zaandam
40 x 72 cm
1871
Walters Art Museum, Santa Barbara
 Boats at Zaandam
45 x 82 cm
1871
Private Collection
 The Zaan at Zaandam
42 x 73 cm
1871
Private collection
 The Zaan at Zaandam
44.5 x 65 cm
1871
Private collection
 The Thames and House of Parliment
47 x 73 cm
1871
National Gallery, London
 The Voorzaan near Zaandam
39 x 71.5 cm
1871
Private Collection
 Guurtje Van de Stadt
73 x 40 cm
1871
Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo
 Windmill at Zaandam
1871
Private Collection
 Windmills Near Zaandam
47 x 73 cm
1871
Private collection
 Zaandam
48 x 73 cm
1871
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Dam at Zaandam, Evening
44.5 x 72.5 cm
1871
Private Collection
 Madame Monet on a Couch
48 x 75 cm
1871
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 A Windmill at Zaandam
1871
Private Collection
 Houses along the Zaan at Zaandam
47.5 x 73.5 cm
1871
Stadeslsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt
 Windmill at Zaandam
43 x 73 cm
1871
Ashmolean Museum of Art, Oxford
 View of Rouen
54 x 73 cm
1872
Private Collection
 Boats at Rouen
47 x 56 cm
1872
Private collection
 The Seine at the Petit Genneviliers
47.5 x 63 cm
1872
Private collection
 Fog Effect
48 x 76 cm
1872
Private collection
 Argenteuil, Seen from the Small Branch of
the Seine
50 x 65 cm
1872
Private collection
 Ships on the Seine at Rouen
37.8 x 46.6 cm
1872
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Argenteuil, Seen from the Small Branch of
the Seine
54.5 x 72.5 cm
1872
Private collection
 Sailing Boat
41.5 x 71.5 cm
1872
Private Collection
 The Fête at Argenteuil
60 x 81 cm
1872
Private collection
 The Petite Bras d'Argenteuil
53 x 73 cm
1872
National Gallery, London
 Pleasure Boats at Argenteuil
47 x 65 cm
1872
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Still Life with Melon
53 x 73 cm
1872
Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Lisbona
 Lilacs, Grey Weather
48 x 64 cm
1872
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 Lilacs in the Sun
50 x 65.8 cm
1872
Puskin Museum, Moscow
 Jean Monet on his Mechanical Horse
59.5 x 73.5 cm
1872
Private Collection
 Grand Quai at Le Havre
1872
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 The Regatta at Argenteuil
48 x 75 cm
1872
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Impression, Sunrise
48 x 63 cm
1872
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 The Hospice at Argenteuil
49.5 x 63.5 cm
1872
Private Collection
 Lane in the Vineyards at Argenteuil
47 x 74 cm
1872
Private collection
 The Basin at Argenteuil
60 x 80.5 cm
1872
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Argenteuil, Late Afternoon
60 x 81 cm
1872
Private collection
 Small Boat on the Small Branch of the Seine
at Argenteuil
51 x 63.5 cm
1872
Private collection
 Lane in the Vineyards at Argenteuil
1872
Private collection
 Argenteuil, the Bridge under Repair
60 x 80.5 cm
1872
Fitzwilliam Museum
 The Tea Service
1872
Private collection, Dallas
 Camille Reading
50 x 65 cm
1872
Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore
 The Promenede at Argenteuil
53 x 73 cm
1872
Private collection
 Argenteuil
50 x 65 cm
1872
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Wooden Bridge
1872
Portland Musem of Art, Portland
 The Gare d'Argenteuil
47.5 x 71 cm
1872
usée Tavet-Delacour / Musée de Luzarches, Conseil général de Val d'Oise, Pontoise
 The Stream of Robec (Rouen)
50 x 65 cm
1872
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Luncheon
162 x 203 cm
1873
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Monet's Garden in Argenteuil (The Dahlias)
61 x 82 cm
1873
Private Collection
 The Red Kerchief: Portrait of Mrs. Monet
99 x 73.5 cm
1873
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland
 Seine at Asnieres
1873
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 Autumn Effect at Argenteuil
56 x 75 cm
1873
Courtauld Institute Galleries, London
 Le Havre Museum
75 x 100 cm
1873
National Gallery, London
 Ripose under the Lilacs
50 x 65 cm
1873
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Walk near Argenteuil
81 x 60 cm
1873
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Poppy Field near Argenteuil
50 x 65 cm
1873
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Bench
60 x 80 cm
c. 1873
Private Collection
 The Seine at Argenteuil
50.5 x 61 cm
1873
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Ships in a Harbor
49.8 x 61 cm
c. 1873
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 The Plain of Colombes, White Frost
55 x 73 cm
1873
The Niigata Perfectual Museum of Art, Niigata
 Camille Monet at a Window, Argenteuil
60 x 49.5 cm
1873
Private Collection
 Sunrise (Marine)
1873
Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles
 The Sheltered Path
54 x 65 cm
1873
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 Walk in the Meadows at Argenteuil
54.5 x 64.5 cm
1873
Private collection
 The Boulevard des Capucines
80 x 60 cm
1873
Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City
 Maisons d'Argenteuil
54 x 73 cm
1873
Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin
 Monet's House at Argenteuil
60.5 x 74 cm
1873
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Camille in the Garden with Jean
59 x 79.5 cm
1873
Private collection
 Camille and Jean Monet at the Garden of
Argenteuil
131 x 97 cm
1873
Private collection
 Snow at Argenteuil
1874
Private Collection
 The Windmill on the Obekende
56 x 65 cm
1874
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
 Woman Seated on a Bench
72 x 54 cm
c. 1874
National Gallery, London
 By the Bridge at Argenteuil
54.5 x 78 cm
1874
Saint Louis Art Museum, Saint Louis
 The Regatta at Argenteuil
60 x 100 cm
1874
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Railway Bridge at Argenteuil
55 x 72 cm
1874
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 The Roadbridge at Argenteuil
50 x 65 cm
1874
Private collection
 Boaters at Argenteuil
60 x 81 cm
1874
Private Collection
 Sunset on the Seine
49.5 x 60 cm
1874
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 Snow on Argenteuil
54.6 x 73.8 cm
1874
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 The Studio Boat
50 x 64 cm
1874
Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo
 Sailboat at the Petit-Gennevilleirs
55 x 64 cm
1874
Private collection
 The Bridge at Argenteuil
60 x 79.7 cm
1874
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 The Bridge at Argenteuil
60 x 81.3 cm
1874
Neue Pinakothek, Munich
 Le Binnen-Amstel, Amsterdam
56.3 x 74 cm
1874
Private collection
 The Zuiderkerk in Amsterdam
54.5 x 64.5 cm
1874
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 Snow at Argenteuil
50.5 x 65 cm
1874
Private Collection
 Snow in Amsterdam
56 x 73 cm
1874
Private collection
 The Bridge at Argenteuil
65.5 x 80 cm
1874
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Camille Monet and a Child in the Artist’s
Garden in Argenteuil
55.3 x 64.7 cm
1875
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Snow in Argenteuil
55.5 x 65 cm
1875
The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
 Madame Monet Embroidering
75 x 55 cm
1875
Barnes Foundation Museum of Art, Marion (Pen.)
 Monet's Garden at Giverny
81.5 x 92 cm
1875
E. G. Bührle Collection, Zurich
 The Studio Boat
80 x 100 cm
1875
Private collection
 The Studio Boat
72 x 60 cm
1875
Barnes Foundation, Merion (Penn.)
 Snow Effect, Argenteuil (Boulevard Saint-
Densi)
66 x 81 cm
1875
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Boulevard de Pontoise under Snow
60 x 81 cm
1875
Öffentliche Kunstsammlung Basel, Basel
 The Train in the Snow
59 x 78 cm
1875
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 In the Garden
70 x 101 cm
1875
Private collection
 Poplars near Argenteuil
54.5 x 65.5 cm
1875
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Taking a Walk near Argenteuil
60 x 81 cm
1875
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 The Walk, Woman with a Parasol
100 x 81 cm
1875
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Woman with a Parasol in the Garden at
Argenteuil
75 x 100 cm
1875
Private collection
 Poppy Field, Summertime
51 x 65.5 cm
1875
Private collection
 The Walk (Argenteuil)
59.5 x 80 cm
1875
Puskin Museum
 Poppies (Argenteuil)
54 x 73.5 cm
1875
Private collection
 The Artist's Family in the Garden
61 x 80.6 cm
1875
Private Collection
 Cliffs at Varengeville
65 x 81 cm
1875
Private Collection
 Red Boats, Argenteuil
55 x 65 cm
1875
Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris
 Camille in the Garden at Argenteuil
81 x 59 cm
1876
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 Ernest Hoschedé with his Daughter Marthe in
1876
86 x 130 cm
1876
Museo Nazional des Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires
 Camille Monet in Japanese Costume
231.8 x 142.3 cm
1876
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Woman in Garden
1876
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 The River Yerres near Montegeron
60 x 82 cm
1876
Private collection
 The Beach at Saint-Adresse
59 x 80 cm
1876
Private Collection
 Gare Saint-Lazare
75 x 100 cm
1876
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 Turkeys
174.5 x 172.5 cm
1876
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Park Monceau
60 x 81 cm
1876
Metropolitan Museum of Art, NewYork
 The Garden, Gladioli
73 x 54.5 cm
1876
Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco
 In the Meadow
60 x 82 cm
1876
Private collection
 The Ball-Shaped Tree, Argenteuil
60 x 81 cm
1876
Private collection
 Monet's House at Argenteuil
63 x 52 cm
1876
Private Collection
 Ice Flows on the Seine at Bougival
65 x 81 cm
c. 1876
Musée del Louvre, Paris
 The Plain at Gennervilliers
50 x 61 cm
1876
Private collection
 The Garden
50 x 65 cm
1876
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 The Shoot
1876
Private collection
 Arriving at Montegeron
81 x 60 cm
1876
Private Collection
 Gladiolas
55 x 82 cm
1876
Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit
 Argenteuil, the Bank of Flower
54 x 65 cm
1877
Private Collection
 Ponte de l'Europe, Gaire Saint-Lazare
64 x 81 cm
1877
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 The Garden, Hollyhocks
73 x 54 cm
1877
Private Collection
 Young Girls in the Rowing Boat
145 x 132 cm
1877
National Museum of Wester Art, Tokyo
 The Gare Saint-Lazare
75 x 100 cm
1877
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Tracks outside Saint-Lazare
60 x 80 cm
1877
Private Collection
 Saint-Lazaire Station
54.3 x 73.6 cm
1877
National Gallery, London
 Exterior of Gaire Saint-Lazare Station, The
Signal
65 x 81.5 cm
1877
Niedersachsische Landesmuseum, Hanover
 Saint-Lazare Station
53.5 x 72.5 cm
1877
National Gallery, London
 Rue Saint-Denis, Holiday of June 30 1878
76 x 52 cm
1878
Musee des Beaux-Arts, Roen
 The Banks of the Seine at Lavacourt, with
domestic geese
60 x 80 cm
1878
Private Collection
 The Church at Vétheuil
65.2 x 55.7 cm
1878
1878, National Gallery of Scotland
 Farmyard
61 x 50 cm
1878
Private collection
 Small Arm of the Seine at Mousseaux
60 x 81 cm
1878
Private Collection
 Arm of the Seine near Vétheuil
60.5 x 80 cm
1878
Private Collection
 The Park Monceau
54 x 65 cm
1878
Private collection
 The Village of Lavacourt
35.5 x 73.8 cm
1878
Private Collection
 The Road Coming into Vétheuil
49.5 x 61 cm
1878
Private Collection
 Apple Trees on the Chantemesle Hill
1878
 The Steps
62 x 50 cm
1878
Private collection
 Apple Trees in Bloom at Vétheuil
55 x 66 cm
1878
Private Collection
 At the Parc Monceau
1878
Private Collection
 Portrait of Leon Peltier
56 x 38 cm
1879
Private collection
 The Seine at Vétheuil
43 x 70 cm
1879
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Camille on her Deathbed
1879
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Chrysanthemums
54 x 65 cm
1878
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 An Apple Tree in Blossom near Vétheuil
65 x 92 cm
1879
Private collection
 Vétheuil, Blossoming Plum Trees
73.5 x 94 cm
1879
Private collection
 The Seine at Vétheuil
81 x 60 cm
1879
Musée des Beaux Arts de Rouen, Rouen
 The Seine at Vétheuil, Effect Sunshine after
Rain
60 x 81 cm
1879
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Church at Vétheuil (winter)
65 x 50 cm
1879
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 Vétheuil, Landscape
60 x 73 cm
1879
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Meadow
79 x 98 cm
1879
Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha (Neb.)
 Poppy Field near Vétheuil
70 x 90 cm
1879
Stifung Sammlung E. G. Buhrle, Zurich
 The Bend of the Seine at Lavacourt, Winter
54 x 65 cm
1879
Private collection
 Vétheuil
60 x 81.6 cm
1879
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
1880s
 Cliffs of Petite-Dalles
59 x 75 cm
1880
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Monet's Studio in Vétheuil
151 x 121 cm
1880
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Apple Tree in Blossom by the Water
73 x 60 cm
1880
Private collection
 Asters
1880
Private Collection
 Portrait of Michael with Hat and Pom Pom
46 x 38 cm
1880
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Bouquet of Mallows
100 x 81 cm
1880
Courtauld Institute Galleries, London
 The Banks of the Seine near Vétheuil
73 x 100 cm
1880
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Lavacourt
100 x 150 cm
1880
Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas
 The Seine at Lavacourt
98.4 x 149.2 cm
1880
Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas
 Portrait of Jean Monet
46 x 37 cm
1880
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 By the Seine near Vétheuil
73 x 100 cm
1880
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Blanche Hoschedé as a Young Girl
46 x 38 cm
1880
Musée des Beaux-Arts et de la Céramique, Rouen
 Breakup of Ice, Grey Weather
68 x 90 cm
1880
Museu Calouste Gulbenkian
 Chantemelse Hamlet at the Foot of the Rock
60 x 80 cm
1880
Private Collection
 Pears and Grapes
65 x 81 cm
1880
Hamburg Kunsthalle, Hamburg
 Floating Ice
97 x 150.5 cm
1880
Shelburne Museum, (Vermont)
 Floating Ice
61 x 100 cm
1880
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Path Through the Poppies, Ile Saint-Martin
80 x 60 cm
1880
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 The Road to Roche-Guyon
60 x 81 cm
1880
Private collection
 Sunflowers
101 x 81.3 cm
1880
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 Springtime in Vétheuil
60.5 x 80.5 cm
1880
Museu Boijmansvan Beuningen, Rotterdam
 River Thawing near Vétheuil
65 x 93 cm
1880
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Vétheuil, Summer
60 x 99.7 cm
1880
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 The Road to Vétheuil
58.5 x 72.5 cm
1880
Phillips Collection, Washington D. C.
 Sunset on the Seine in Winter
60 x 80 cm
1880
Private Collection
 Chrysanthemums
100 x 80 cm
1880
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 Woman Seated under the Willows
81 x 60 cm
1880
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Vétheuil, Flooded Meadow
60 x 73.5 cm
1881
Private Collection
 The Garden at Vétheuil
60 x 73 cm
1881
Private collection
 Cliffs of Petit-Dalles
60 x 74 cm
1881
Private collection
 Boat Lying at Low Tide
80 x 60 cm
1881
Tokyo Fiji Art, Tokyo
 The Cliff at Grainval near Fécamp
61 x 80 cm
1881
Private Collection
 Alice Hoschedé in the Garden
81 x 65 cm
1881
Private Collection
 View taken from Grainval
61 x 81 cm
1881
Private Collection
 A Field of Corn
65.5 x 81.5 cm
1881
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland
 Gust of Wind
81 x 65.5 cm
1881
Private collection
 The Seine seen from the Hills of Chantemesle
14.4 x 23.3 cm
1881
Musée delle Ville de Rouen, Rouen
 The Cliff at Fécamp
63.5 x 80 cm
1881
Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museum
 Stormy Sea
60 x 74 cm
1881
National Gallery of Canada, Ottowa
 Hills near Vétheuil
14.4 x 22.1 cm
1881
Musée delle Ville de Rouen, Rouen
 The Needle and the Porte d'Aval
65 x 81 cm
1881
Sterling and Francine Clark Institute, Williamstown
 The Sea Viewed from Grainval
60 x 75 cm
1881
Private Collection
 A Spot on the Bank of the Seine
81 x 60 cm
1881
Private collection
 The Hut in Trouville, Low Tide
60 x 73.5 cm
1881
Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
 Vase of Dahlias
128.5 x 37 cm
1882
Private collection
 The Fishermen on the Seine near Poissy
60 x 82 cm
1882
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
 Fishing Boats off Pourville
54 x 65 cm
1882
Private collection
 Fishing Boats on the Cliffs at Pourville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Private collection
 Dahlias
128.5 x 37 cm
1882
Private collection
 Cliffs at Dieppe
65 x 81 cm
1882
Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich
 Cliffs at Pourville
60 x 73 cm
1882
Private collection
 Fishing Nets at Pourville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, Rochester (N.Y.)
 Low Tide at Varengeville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid
 Cliffs near Pourville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
 Pourville, Flood Tide
65 x 81 cm
1882
Brooklyn Museum, New York
 Pourville, Low Tide
63 x 77 cm
1882
Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester, New York
 Vase of Peonies
1882
Private Collection
 Shadows on the Sea The Cliffs at Pourville
57 x 80 cm
1882
Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen
 Pourville, near Dieppe
60 x 81 cm
1882
Private Collection
 Three Pots of Tulips
50.5 x 37 cm
1882
Private collection
 The Cook (Monsieur Paul)
65 x 52 cm
1882
Österreichische Galerie Belvedere, Vienna
 The Customs Official's House at Varengville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
 The Sunken Road in the Cliff at Varangeville
60.5 x 73.5 cm
1882
Garman Ryan Collection, New Art Gallery Walsall, Walsall
 Path in the Wheatfield at Pourville
58.2 x 78 cm
1882
Private Collection
 Low Tide at Pourville, near Dieppe
1882
Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland
 Varengeville Church
65 x 81 cm
1882
Barber Institute of Fine Arts, University of Birmingham
 The Two Anglers
38 x 52 cm
1882
Private collection
 The Pointe de l'Ailly, Low Tide
60 x 100 cm
1882
Private Collection
 Road at La Cavée, Pourville
60.3 x 81.6 cm
1882
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 The Path of La Cave at Pourville
60 x 81 cm
1882
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 The Path of La Cavée at Pourville
73 x 60 cm
1882
Private collection
 The Church at Varengeville, Effect of
Morning
60 x 73 cm
1882
Private Collection
 The Pointe de l'Ailly, Low Tide
60 x 100 cm
1882
Kerry Stokes Collection, Perth
 Étretat, the Beach and the Porte d'Aval
60 x 73 cm
1883
Marauchi Art Museum, Tokyo
 Étretat, Sunset
63 x 73 cm
1883
Private Collection
 Étretat, Setting Sun
60.5 x 81.8 cm
1883
North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh (N. C.)
1890s
 Grainstacks, Midday
65.6 x 100.6 cm
1890
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
 Grain Stacks, End of Summer
60 x 100 cm
1890
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Grainstack, Sun in the Mist
65 x 100 cm
1890
Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis
 Oat and Poppy Field
73 x 92 cm
1890
Private Collection
 Grain Stacks, (Effects of Snow, Morning)
65 x 100 cm
1890
Private Collection
 Field of Poppies
60.5 x 100 cm
1890
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Effect of Spring at Giverny
60 x 100 cm
1890
Private collection
 Stack of Wheat
65.6 x 92 cm
1890
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Stack of Wheat (Snow Effect, Overcast Day)
66 x 93 cm
1890
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Monet's Garden, The Iris
81 x 92 cm
1890
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Oat Fields (Giverny)
73 x 92 cm
1890
Private Collection
 The Road to Vétheuil
68 x 90 cm
1890
Private Collection
 Grain Stack. (Sunset)
73.3 x 92.7 cm
1890
Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 The Pink Skiff
135 x 175 cm
1890
Private Collection
 Two Grain Stacks, Close of Day, Autumn
65.5 x 100 cm
1890
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Stack of Wheat (Thaw, Sunset)
64.9 x 92.3 cm
1890
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Portrait of Suzanne Hoschedé with
Sunflowers
162 x 107 cm
c. 1890
Private Collection
 Grainstacks at the End of Summer, Evening
Effect
101 x 65.8 cm
1891
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Grain Stack, Sunset
65 x 92 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Grainstack, Sun in the Mist
60 x 100 cm
1891
Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis
 Grain Stack, Effect Snow, Overcast Sky
66 x 93 cm
1891
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Three Trees in Autumn
92 x 72 cm
1891
Private collection
 Row of Poplars
100 x 65 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Poplars (Evening Effect)
100 x 65 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Poplars along the Epte (Sunset Effect)
100 x 65 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Grain Stack under the Sun
60 x 100 cm
1891
Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich
 Three Trees, Summer
92 x 73 cm
1891
National Museum of Western Art, Toyko
 Grain Stack at Sunset, Winter
65 x 92 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Three Rose Trees, Autumn
81.9 x 81.6 cm
1891
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 Poplars, Wind Effect
100 x 73 cm
1891
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Grain Stack at Sunset
73 x 92 cm
1891
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Poplars along the Epte
88 x 93 cm
1891
Private Collection
 Grain Stacks, Snow Effect, Morning
65 x 92 cm
1891
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Cathedral of Rouen. Morning Sun, Blue
Harmony
91 x 63 cm
1892
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 The Cathedral of Roeun, The Portal, Gray
Weather
100 x 65 cm
1892
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Floating Ice at Bennecourt
65 x 100 cm
1892
Private collection
 Rouen Cathedral, Facade
104.4 x 65.4 cm
1892
Pola Museum of Art, Sengokuhara
 A Meadow at Giverny
92 x 73 cm
1893
Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton (N.J.)
 Cathedral of Rouen, The Portal and Tower of
Saint-Roman, Effect Morning
106 x 73 cm
1893
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Cathedral of Rouen, the Portal, Morning
Sun
107 x 73 cm
1893
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Springtime Landscape at Giverny
92 x 65 cm
1894
Private collection
 Springtime Landscape
92 x 73 cm
1894
Private collection
 Vernon Church in the Fog
1894
Private Collection
 The Cathedral of Rouen at Sunset
100 x 65 cm
1894
Museum Pushkin, Moscow
1900s
 Charing Cross Bridge, Overcast Weather
60 x 92 cm
1900
Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge (Mass.)
 Houses of Parliament, Sunset
81 x 92 cm
1900
Private collection
 Houses of Parliament, Westminster
81 x 92 cm
1900
Private collection
 Houses of Parliament, Sunlight Effect
81 x 92 cm
1900
Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn (N.Y.)
 Houses of Parliament, Seagulls
81 x 92 cm
1900
Art Museum, Princeton University, Princeton (N.J.)
 Houses of Parliament (Setting Sun)
81 x 92 cm
1900
Private Collection
 Houses of Parliament, Fog Effect
81 x 92 cm
1900
Museum of Fine Arts, Saint Petersburg (Fla.)
 Houses of Parliamnet, Symphonie in Rose
81 x 92 cm
1900
Private collection
 Houses of Parliament, Sunset
81 x 92 cm
1900
Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich
 Houses of Parliament, Stormy Skies
81 x 92 cm
1900
Musee de Beaux-Arts, Lille
 Charing Cross Bridge, Fog on the Thames
73 x 92 cm
1900
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Waterloo Bridge
64.5 x 91.3 cm
1900
Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara
 Houses of Parliament, Sunset
81 x 92 cm
1900
Private collection
 Houses of Parliament, Effect of Sun in the
Fog
81 x 92 cm
Private Collection. London.
 The Water Lily Pond (Japanese Bridge)
89 x 100 cm
1900
Private Collection
 The Water Lily Bridge (Japanese Bridge)
99.11 x 88.9 cm
1900
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Houses of Parliament, Effect of Sunlight in
the Fog
81 x 92 cm
1900
Musee d'Orsay, Paris
 Houses of Parliament, Reflections on the
Thames
81 x 92 cm
1900
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 Houses of Parliament (Rays of Sun and Fog)
81 x 92 cm
1901
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 View of Vétheuil
90 x 92.1 cm
1901
Museum Pushkin, Moscow
 Main Path through the Garden at Giverny
82 x 92 cm
1901
Oesterreichische Galerie Belvedere, Vienna
 View of Vétheuil
90 x 93 cm
1901
National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
 Waterloo Bridge, Fog Effect
65 x 100 cm
1901
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg
 Water Lilies. Water Landscape, Clouds
73 x 100 cm
1903
Private Collection
 Water Lilies
89 x 100 cm
1903
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 Waterloo Bridge, Sunliight Effect
65 x 100 cm
1903
Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore
 The Houses of Parliament, Sunset
81.3 x 92.5 cm
1903
National Gallery, London
 Parliment, Sun and Fog
1904
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 Houses of Parliament, Effect of Fog
92.7 x 82.6 cm
1904
Museum of Fine art, Saint Petersburg
 Water Lilies
81 x 92 cm
1906
National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
 Water Lilies
90 x 100 cm
1905
Private Collection
 Water Lilies
89 x 100 cm
1905
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 Venice at Dusk
73 x 92 cm
1908
Bridgestone Museum of Art , Tokyo
 Palazzo Ducale
81 x 100 cm
1908
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
 The Palazzo Dario
81 x 66 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Rio della Salute
100 x 65 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Rio della Salute
81 x 65 cm
1908
Private Foundation, Baltimore
 Gondola in Venice
81 x 55 cm
1908
Musee des Beaux Arts de Nantes, Nantes
 Palazzo Dario
56 x 75 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Palazzo Dario
64.8 x 80.7 cm
1908
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
 Water Lilies
90 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Water Lilies
92 x 90 cm
1908
Worchester Art Museum, Worchester (Mass.)
 Palazzo Dario
92 x 73 cm
1908
National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
 Palazzo Dario
81 x 61 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Palazzo Contarini
92 x 81 cm
1908
Kunstmuseum Saint Gallen, St.Gallen
 Palazzo Contarini
73 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Venice, Twilight
73 x 92 cm
1908
Bridgestone Museum of Art , Tokyo
 San Giorgio by Twilight
65 x 92 cm
1908
National Museum and Gallery of Wales, Cardiff
 The Doges' Palace
57 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 Palazzo da Mula
62 x 81 cm
1908
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Palazzo da Mula, Venice
62 x 81.1 cm
1908
National Gallery of Art, Washington D. C.
 Grand Canal, Venice
1908
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
 San Giorgio at Venice
60 x 73 cm
1908
Private Collection
 San Giorgio Maggiore
65 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 San Giorgio Maggiore
60 x 73 cm
1908
Collection of Alice F. Mason, New York
 San Giorgio Maggiore
64.8 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 The Gran Canal, Venice
73 x 92 cm
1908
San Fracisco Museum of Art, San Francisco
 The Gran Canal, Venice
73 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 The Gran Canal, Venice
81.2 x 91.4 cm
1908
Private Collection
 The Gran Canal, Venice
73 x 92 cm
1908
Private Collection
 The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio
Maggiore
65.5 x 2 cm
1908
(destroyed in fire)
 The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio
Maggiore
65 x 100 cm
1908
Private Collection, New York
 The Doges Palace seen from San Giorgio
Maggiore
65 x 100 cm
1908
Private Collection
 The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio
Maggiore
65 x 100 cm
1908
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
 The Red House
65 x 81.6 cm
1908
Galerie Rosengart, Lucerne
1910s
 Yellow Irises
200 x 100 cm
1914
National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
 Water Lilies
200.5 x 201 cm
1914
National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo
 Water Lilies
150 x 200 cm
1914
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 Nymphéas (Waterlilies)
181 x 201.6 cm
1914
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
 Self Portrait
77 x 55 cm
1917
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
 The Japanese Bridge at Giverny
89 x 100 cm
1918
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 The Japanese Bridge
89 x 100 cm
1918
Musée Marmottan, Paris
 Weeping Willow
131.2 x 110.3 cm
1918
Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus (Oh.)
1920s
 Grandes Decorations. The Setting Sun
200 x 600 cm
1920
Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris
 The House of the Artist, View of the Rose
Garden
89 x 92 cm
1922
Musée Marmottan, Paris
ALPHABETICAL LIST OF PAINTINGS

Monet’s water lily garden in Giverny

 Index of Paintings

A Field of Corn
A Meadow at Giverny
A Spot on the Bank of the Seine
A Windmill at Zaandam
Alice Hoschedé in the Garden
An Apple Tree in Blossom near Vétheuil
Apple Tree in Blossom by the Water
Apple Trees in Bloom at Vétheuil
Apple Trees on the Chantemesle Hill
Argenteuil
Argenteuil, Late Afternoon
Argenteuil, Seen from the Small Branch of the Seine
Argenteuil, Seen from the Small Branch of the Seine
Argenteuil, the Bank of Flower
Argenteuil, the Bridge under Repair
Arm of the Seine near Vétheuil
Arriving at Montegeron
Asters
At the Parc Monceau
Autumn Effect at Argenteuil
Bathers at Grenouillere
Blanche Hoschedé as a Young Girl
Boat Lying at Low Tide
Boaters at Argenteuil
Boats at Honfleur
Boats at Rouen
Boats at Zaandam
Boatyard near Honfleur
Bonnières, Quick Sketch
Boulevard de Pontoise under Snow
Bouquet of Mallows
Breakup of Ice, Grey Weather
By the Bridge at Argenteuil
By the Seine near Vétheuil
Camille and Jean Monet at the Garden of Argenteuil
Camille at the Beach at Trouville
 Camille in the Garden at Argenteuil
Camille in the Garden with Jean
Camille Monet and a Child in the Artist’s Garden in Argenteuil
Camille Monet at a Window, Argenteuil
Camille Monet in Japanese Costume
Camille on her Deathbed
Camille on the Beach
Camille or The Woman in a Green Dress
Camille Reading
Camille Sitting on the Beach at Trouville
Camille with a Small Dog
Canal in Zaandam
Cathedral of Rouen, The Portal and Tower of Saint-Roman, Effect
Morning
Cathedral of Rouen. Morning Sun, Blue Harmony
Chantemelse Hamlet at the Foot of the Rock
Charing Cross Bridge, Fog on the Thames
Charing Cross Bridge, Overcast Weather
Chrysanthemums
Chrysanthemums
Cliffs at Dieppe
Cliffs at Pourville
Cliffs at Varengeville
Cliffs near Pourville
Cliffs of Petit-Dalles
Cliffs of Petite-Dalles
Dahlias
Effect of Spring at Giverny
Entrance to the Port of Trouville
Ernest Hoschedé with his Daughter Marthe in 1876
Étretat, Setting Sun
Étretat, Sunset
Étretat, the Beach and the Porte d'Aval
Exterior of Gaire Saint-Lazare Station, The Signal
Farmyard
Farmyard in Normandy
Farmyardnear Honfleur
Field of Poppies
Fishing Boats
Fishing Boats off Pourville
Fishing Boats on the Cliffs at Pourville
Fishing Nets at Pourville
Floating Ice
Floating Ice
Floating Ice at Bennecourt
Flowers and Fruit
Fog Effect
Fontainebleau Forest
Garden in Flower
Gardens of the Princess
Gare Saint-Lazare
Gladiolas
Gondola in Venice
Grain Stack at Sunset
Grain Stack at Sunset, Winter
Grain Stack under the Sun
Grain Stack, Effect Snow, Overcast Sky
Grain Stack, Sunset
Grain Stack. (Sunset)
Grain Stacks, (Effects of Snow, Morning)
Grain Stacks, End of Summer
Grain Stacks, Snow Effect, Morning
Grainstack, Sun in the Mist
Grainstack, Sun in the Mist
Grainstacks at the End of Summer, Evening Effect
Grainstacks, Midday
Grand Canal, Venice
Grand Quai at Le Havre
Grandes Decorations. The Setting Sun
Green Park
Gust of Wind
Guurtje Van de Stadt
Haystacks at Chailly at Sunrise
Hills near Vétheuil
Hôtel des Roches Noires Trouville
Houses along the Zaan at Zaandam
Houses of Parliament (Rays of Sun and Fog)
Houses of Parliament (Setting Sun)
Houses of Parliament, Effect of Fog
Houses of Parliament, Effect of Sun in the Fog
Houses of Parliament, Effect of Sunlight in the Fog
Houses of Parliament, Fog Effect
Houses of Parliament, Reflections on the Thames
Houses of Parliament, Seagulls
Houses of Parliament, Stormy Skies
Houses of Parliament, Sunlight Effect
Houses of Parliament, Sunset
Houses of Parliament, Sunset
Houses of Parliament, Sunset
Houses of Parliament, Westminster
Houses of Parliamnet, Symphonie in Rose
Hunting Trophy
Ice Flows on the Seine at Bougival
Impression, Sunrise
In the Garden
In the Meadow
Infantry Guards Wandering Along the River
Interior, after Dinner
Jar of Peaches
Jean Monet on his Mechanical Horse
Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre in a Garden
La Chapelle de Notre-Dame-de Grace, Honfleur
La Pointe de la Hève
La Rue de La Bavolle at Honfleur
Lane in Normandy
Lane in the Vineyards at Argenteuil
Lane in the Vineyards at Argenteuil
Lavacourt
Le Binnen-Amstel, Amsterdam
Le Havre Museum
Le Phare de l'Hospice
Lilacs in the Sun
Lilacs, Grey Weather
Low Tide at Pourville, near Dieppe
Low Tide at Varengeville
Luncheon on the Grass (centre)
Luncheon on the Grass (left side)
Madame Monet Embroidering
Madame Monet on a Couch
Main Path through the Garden at Giverny
Maisons d'Argenteuil
Monet's Garden at Giverny
Monet's Garden in Argenteuil (The Dahlias)
Monet's Garden, The Iris
Monet's House at Argenteuil
Monet's House at Argenteuil
Monet's Studio in Vétheuil
Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
Nymphéas (Waterlilies)
Oat and Poppy Field
Oat Fields (Giverny)
Palazzo Contarini
Palazzo Contarini
Palazzo da Mula
Palazzo da Mula, Venice
Palazzo Dario
Palazzo Dario
Palazzo Dario
Palazzo Dario
Palazzo Ducale
Parliment, Sun and Fog
Path in the Wheatfield at Pourville
Path Through the Poppies, Ile Saint-Martin
Pears and Grapes
Pleasure Boats at Argenteuil
Pointe at Heve at Low Tide
Ponte de l'Europe, Gaire Saint-Lazare
Poplars (Evening Effect)
Poplars along the Epte
Poplars along the Epte (Sunset Effect)
Poplars near Argenteuil
Poplars, Wind Effect
Poppies (Argenteuil)
Poppy Field near Argenteuil
Poppy Field near Vétheuil
Poppy Field, Summertime
Portrait of J. F. Jaxquesmart with a Parasol
Portrait of Jean Monet
Portrait of Leon Peltier
Portrait of Madame Gaudibert
Portrait of Michael with Hat and Pom Pom
Portrait of Suzanne Hoschedé with Sunflowers
Pourville, Flood Tide
Pourville, Low Tide
Pourville, near Dieppe
Red Boats, Argenteuil
Red Mullets
Rio della Salute
Rio della Salute
Ripose under the Lilacs
River Scene at Bennecourt
River Thawing near Vétheuil
Road at La Cavée, Pourville
Road by Saint-Siméon Farm
Rouen Cathedral, Facade
Row of Poplars
Rue Saint-Denis, Holiday of June 30 1878
Sailboat at the Petit-Gennevilleirs
Sailing Boat
Sainte-Adresse
Saint-Germain-l'Auzerrois
Saint-Lazaire Station
Saint-Lazare Station
San Giorgio at Venice
San Giorgio by Twilight
San Giorgio Maggiore
San Giorgio Maggiore
San Giorgio Maggiore
Seascape
Seascape, Storm
Seaside at Honfleur
Seine at Asnieres
Self Portrait
Shadows on the Sea The Cliffs at Pourville
Ships in a Harbor
Ships on the Seine at Rouen
Small Arm of the Seine at Mousseaux
Small Boat on the Small Branch of the Seine at Argenteuil
Snow at Argenteuil
Snow at Argenteuil
Snow Effect, Argenteuil (Boulevard Saint-Densi)
Snow in Amsterdam
Snow in Argenteuil
Snow near Honfleur
Snow on Argenteuil
Springtime in Vétheuil
Springtime Landscape
Springtime Landscape at Giverny
Stack of Wheat
Stack of Wheat (Snow Effect, Overcast Day)
Stack of Wheat (Thaw, Sunset)
Still Life with Bottle, Bread and Wine
Still Life with Meat
Still Life with Melon
Still Life with Pheasant
Stormy Sea
Stormy Sea at Étretat
Street in Sainte-Adresse
Sunflowers
Sunrise (Marine)
Sunset on the Seine
Sunset on the Seine in Winter
Taking a Walk near Argenteuil
Taling a Walk on the Cliff at Sainte-Adresse
Terrace at Sainte-Adresse
The Artist's Family in the Garden
The Ball-Shaped Tree, Argenteuil
The Banks of the Seine at Lavacourt, with domestic geese
The Banks of the Seine near Vétheuil
The Basin at Argenteuil
The Beach at Saint-Adresse
The Beach at Sainte-Adresse
The Beach at Sainte-Adresse
The Bench
The Bend of the Seine at Lavacourt, Winter
The Boardwalk at Trouville
The Bodmer Oak, Forest of Fontainebleau
The Boulevard des Capucines
The Bridge at Argenteuil
The Bridge at Argenteuil
The Bridge at Argenteuil
The Bridge at Bougival
The Cart, Alley under the Snow at Honfleur
The Cathedral of Roeun, The Portal, Gray Weather
The Cathedral of Rouen at Sunset
The Cathedral of Rouen, the Portal, Morning Sun
The Church at Varengeville, Effect of Morning
The Church at Vétheuil
The Church at Vétheuil (winter)
The Cliff at Fécamp
The Cliff at Grainval near Fécamp
The Cook (Monsieur Paul)
The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son Jean
The Customs Official's House at Varengville
The Dam at Zaandam, Evening
The Doges' Palace
The Doges Palace seen from San Giorgio Maggiore
The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio Maggiore
The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio Maggiore
The Doges' Palace seen from San Giorgio Maggiore
The Entrance to the Port of Honfleur
The Fête at Argenteuil
The Fishermen on the Seine near Poissy
The Garden
The Garden at Vétheuil
The Garden, Gladioli
The Garden, Hollyhocks
The Gare d'Argenteuil
The Gare Saint-Lazare
The Gran Canal, Venice
The Gran Canal, Venice
The Gran Canal, Venice
The Gran Canal, Venice
The Hospice at Argenteuil
The House of the Artist, View of the Rose Garden
The Houses of Parliament, Sunset
The Hut in Trouville, Low Tide
The Japanese Bridge
The Japanese Bridge at Giverny
The Jetty at La Havre
The Landing Stage
The Luncheon
The Magpie
The Meadow
The Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
The Needle and the Porte d'Aval
The Palazzo Dario
The Park Monceau
The Park Monceau
The Path of La Cave at Pourville
The Path of La Cavée at Pourville
The Pavé de Chailly
The Petite Bras d'Argenteuil
The Pink Skiff
The Plain at Gennervilliers
The Plain of Colombes, White Frost
The Point de la Heve
The Pointe de l'Ailly, Low Tide
The Pointe de l'Ailly, Low Tide
The Port at Zaandam
The Port of London
The Promenede at Argenteuil
The Quai at the Louvre
The Railway Bridge at Argenteuil
The Red House
The Red Kerchief: Portrait of Mrs. Monet
The Regatta at Argenteuil
The Regatta at Argenteuil
The River Yerres near Montegeron
The Road Coming into Vétheuil
The Road to Roche-Guyon
The Road to Vétheuil
The Road to Vétheuil
The Roadbridge at Argenteuil
The Sea Viewed from Grainval
The Seine at Argenteuil
The Seine at Lavacourt
The Seine at the Petit Genneviliers
The Seine at Vétheuil
The Seine at Vétheuil
The Seine at Vétheuil, Effect Sunshine after Rain
The Seine seen from the Hills of Chantemesle
The Sheltered Path
The Shoot
The Steps
The Stream of Robec (Rouen)
The Studio Boat
The Studio Boat
The Studio Boat
The Sunken Road in the Cliff at Varangeville
The Tea Service
The Thames and House of Parliment
The Train in the Snow
The Two Anglers
The Village of Lavacourt
The Voorzaan near Zaandam
The Walk (Argenteuil)
The Walk (Bazille and Camille)
The Walk near Argenteuil
The Walk, Woman with a Parasol
The Water Lily Bridge (Japanese Bridge)
The Water Lily Pond (Japanese Bridge)
The Windmill on the Obekende
The Wooden Bridge
The Zaan at Zaandam
The Zaan at Zaandam
The Zuiderkerk in Amsterdam
Three Pots of Tulips
Three Rose Trees, Autumn
Three Trees in Autumn
Three Trees, Summer
Towing of a Boat at Honfleur
Tracks outside Saint-Lazare
Train in the Countryside
Trouville Beach
Turkeys
Two Grain Stacks, Close of Day, Autumn
Unloading Coal
Varengeville Church
Vase of Dahlias
Vase of Peonies
Venice at Dusk
Venice, Twilight
Vernon Church in the Fog
Vétheuil
Vétheuil, Blossoming Plum Trees
Vétheuil, Flooded Meadow
Vétheuil, Landscape
Vétheuil, Summer
View of Rouelles
View of Rouen
View of Vétheuil
View of Vétheuil
View taken from Grainval
Walk in the Meadows at Argenteuil
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies
Water Lilies. Water Landscape, Clouds
Waterloo Bridge
Waterloo Bridge, Fog Effect
Waterloo Bridge, Sunliight Effect
Weeping Willow
Windmill at Zaandam
Windmill at Zaandam
Windmills Near Zaandam
Windmills Near Zaandam
Woman in Garden
Woman Seated on a Bench
Woman Seated under the Willows
Woman with a Parasol in the Garden at Argenteuil
Woodgatherers at the Edge of the Forest
Yellow Irises
Young Girls in the Rowing Boat
Zaandam
 The Biography

Claude Monet and his nympheas (water lilies)

THE FRENCH IMPRESSIONISTS by Camille
Mauclair

Translated by P. G. Konody

Camille Mauclair (1872-1945) was a French biographer and art critic. He

was initially a poet and also wrote several novels, which were reasonably
successful in France. Later in life he wrote mainly non-fiction, including
travel writing and biographies of writers, artists and musicians. In his art
criticism, he supported Impressionism and in 1907 he published this
detailed account of the Impressionists, with the fifth chapter
concentrating on the works and influence of Claude Monet.
Camille Mauclair by Lucien Lévy Dhurmer, 1896
 CONTENTS
AUTHOR’S NOTE
NOTE TO LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
I THE PRECURSORS OF IMPRESSIONISM
II THE THEORY OF THE IMPRESSIONISTS
III EDOUARD MANET: HIS WORK, HIS INFLUENCE
IV EDGAR DEGAS: HIS WORK, HIS INFLUENCE
V CLAUDE MONET: HIS WORK, HIS INFLUENCE
VI AUGUSTE RENOIR AND HIS WORK
VII THE SECONDARY PAINTERS OF IMPRESSIONISM
VIII THE MODERN ILLUSTRATORS CONNECTED WITH
IMPRESSIONISM:
IX NEO-IMPRESSIONISM
 AUTHOR’S NOTE
It should be stated here that, with the exception of one reproduction after
the Neo-Impressionist Van Rysselberghe, the other forty-nine engravings
illustrating this volume I owe to the courtesy of M. Durand-Ruel, from
the first the friend of the Impressionist painters, and later the most
important collector of their works, a friend who has been good enough to
place at our disposal the photographs from which our illustrations have
been reproduced. Chosen from a considerable collection which has been
formed for thirty years past, these photographs, none of which are for
sale, form a veritable and unique museum of documents on Impressionist
art, which is made even more valuable through the dispersal of the
principal masterpieces of this art among the private collections of Europe
and America. We render our thanks to M. Durand-Ruel no less in the
name of the public interested in art, than in our own.
 NOTE TO LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The illustrations contained in this volume have been taken from different
epochs of the Impressionist movement. They will give but a feeble idea
of the extreme abundance of its production.
Banished from the salons, exhibited in private galleries and sold direct
to art lovers, the Impressionist works have been but little seen. The series
left by Caillebotte to the Luxembourg Gallery is very badly shown and is
composed of interesting works which, however, date back to the early
period, and are very inferior to the beautiful productions which followed
later. Renoir is best represented. The private galleries in Paris, where the
best Impressionist works are to be found, are those of MM. Durand-Ruel,
Rouart, de Bellis, de Camondo, and Manzi, to which must be added the
one sold by MM. Théodore Duret and Faure, and the one of Mme. Ernest
Rouart, daughter of Mme. Morisot, the sister-in-law of Manet. The
public galleries of M. Durand-Ruel’s show-rooms are the place where it
is easiest to find numerous Impressionist pictures.
In spite of the firm opposition of the official juries, a place of honour
was reserved at the Exposition of 1889 for Manet, and at that of 1900 a
fine collection of Impressionists occupied two rooms and caused a
considerable stir.
Amongst the critics who have most faithfully assisted this group of
artists, I must mention, besides the early friends previously referred to,
Castagnary, Burty, Edouard de Goncourt, Roger Marx, Geffroy, Arsène
Alexandre, Octave Mirbeau, L. de Fourcaud, Clemenceau, Mallarmé,
Huysmans, Jules Laforgue, and nearly all the critics of the Symbolist
reviews. A book on “Impressionist Art” by M. Georges Lecomte has
been published by the firm of Durand-Ruel as an edition-de-luxe. But the
bibliography of this art consists as yet almost exclusively of articles in
journals and reviews and of some isolated biographical pamphlets.
Manet is, amongst many, the one who has excited most criticism of all
kinds; the articles, caricatures and pamphlets relating to his work would
form a considerable collection. It should be added that, with the
exception of Manet two years before his death, and Renoir last year at
the age of sixty-eight, no Impressionist has been decorated by the French
government. In England such a distinction has even less importance in
itself than elsewhere. But if I insist upon it, it is only to draw attention to
the fact that, through the sheer force of their talent, men like Degas,
Monet and Pissarro have achieved great fame and fortune, without
gaining access to the Salons, without official encouragement, decoration,
subvention or purchases for the national museums. This is a very
significant instance and serves well to complete the physiognomy of this
group of independents.
 I THE PRECURSORS OF IMPRESSIONISM
THE BEGINNING OF THIS MOVEMENT AND THE ORIGIN OF ITS NAME

It will be beyond the scope of this volume to give a complete history of

French Impressionism, and to include all the attractive details to which it
might lead, as regards the movement itself and the very curious epoch
during which its evolution has taken place. The proportions of this book
confine its aim to the clearest possible summing up for the British reader
of the ideas, the personalities and the works of a considerable group of
artists who, for various reasons, have remained but little known and who
have only too frequently been gravely misjudged. These reasons are very
obvious: first, the Impressionists have been unable to make a show at the
Salons, partly because the jury refused them admission, partly because
they held aloof of their own free will. They have, with very rare
exceptions, exhibited at special minor galleries, where they become
known to a very restricted public. Ever attacked, and poor until the last
few years, they enjoyed none of the benefits of publicity and sham glory.
It is only quite recently that the admission of the incomplete and badly
arranged Caillebotte collection to the Luxembourg Gallery has enabled
the public to form a summary idea of Impressionism. To conclude the
enumeration of the obstacles, it must be added that there are hardly any
photographs of Impressionist works in the market. As it is, photography
is but a poor translation of these canvases devoted to the study of the
play of light; but even this very feeble means of distribution has been
withheld from them! Exhibited at some galleries, gathered principally by
Durand-Ruel, sold directly to art-lovers — foreigners mostly — these
large series of works have practically remained unknown to the French
public. All the public heard was the reproaches and sarcastic comments
of the opponents, and they never became aware that in the midst of
modern life the greatest, the richest movement was in progress, which
the French school had known since the days of Romanticism.
Impressionism has been made known to them principally by the
controversies and by the fruitful consequences of this movement for the
illustration and study of contemporary life.
 MANET — REST
I do not profess to give here a detailed and complete history of
Impressionism, for which several volumes like the present one would be
required. I shall only try to compile an ensemble of concise and very
precise notions and statements bearing upon this vast subject. It will be
my special object to try and prove that Impressionism is neither an
isolated manifestation, nor a violent denial of the French traditions, but
nothing more or less than a logical return to the very spirit of these
traditions, contrary to the theories upheld by its detractors. It is for this
reason that I have made use of the first chapter to say a few words on the
precursors of this movement.
No art manifestation is really isolated. However new it may seem, it is
always based upon the previous epochs. The true masters do not give
lessons, because art cannot be taught, but they set the example. To
admire them does not mean to imitate them: it means the recognition in
them of the principles of originality and the comprehension of their
source, so that this eternal source may be called to life in oneself, this
source which springs from a sincere and sympathetic vision of the
aspects of life. The Impressionists have not escaped this beautiful law. I
shall speak of them impartially, without excessive enthusiasm; and it will
be my special endeavour to demonstrate in each of them the cult of a
predecessor, for there have been few artistic movements where the love
for, and one might say the hereditary link with, the preceding masters has
been more tenacious.
The Academy has struggled violently against Impressionism, accusing
it of madness, of systematic negation of the “laws of beauty,” which it
pretended to defend and of which it claimed to be the official priest. The
Academy has shown itself hostile to a degree in this quarrel. It has
excluded the Impressionists from the Salons, from awards, from official
purchases. Only quite recently the acceptance of the Caillebotte bequest
to the Luxembourg Gallery gave rise to a storm of indignation among the
official painters. I shall, in the course of this book, enter upon the value
of these attacks. Meanwhile I can only say how regrettable this obstinacy
appears to me and will appear to every free spirit. It is unworthy even of
an ardent conviction to condemn a whole group of artists en bloc as
fools, enemies of beauty, or as tricksters anxious to degrade the art of
their nation, when these artists worked during forty years towards the
same goal, without getting any reward for their effort, but poverty and
derision. It is now about ten years since Impressionism has taken root,
since its followers can sell their canvases, and since they are admired and
praised by a solid and ever-growing section of the public. The hour has
therefore arrived, calmly to consider a movement which has imposed
itself upon the history of French art from 1860 to 1900 with extreme
energy, to leave dithyrambics as well as polemics, and to speak of it with
a view to exactness. The Academy, in continuing the propagation of an
ideal of beauty fixed by canons derived from Greek, Latin and
Renaissance art, and neglecting the Gothic, the Primitives and the
Realists, looks upon itself as the guardian of the national tradition,
because it exercises an hierarchic authority over the Ecole de Rome, the
Salons, and the Ecole des Beaux Arts. All the same, its ideals are of very
mixed origin and very little French. Its principles are the same by which
the academic art of nearly all the official schools of Europe is governed.
This mythological and allegorical art, guided by dogmas and formulas
which are imposed upon all pupils regardless of their temperament, is far
more international than national. To an impartial critic this statement will
show in an even more curious light the excommunication jealously
issued by the academic painters against French artists, who, far from
revolting in an absurd spirit of parti-pris against the genius of their race,
are perhaps more sincerely attached to it than their persecutors. Why
should a group of men deliberately choose to paint mad, illogical, bad
pictures, and reap a harvest of public derision, poverty and sterility? It
would be uncritical to believe merely in a general mystification which
makes its authors the worst sufferers. Simple common sense will find in
these men a conviction, a sincerity, a sustained effort, and this alone
should, in the name of the sacred solidarity of those who by various
means try to express their love of the beautiful, suppress the annoying
accusations hurled too light-heartedly against Manet and his friends.

MANET — IN THE SQUARE

I shall define later on the ideas of the Impressionists on technique,
composition and style in painting. Meanwhile it will be necessary to
indicate their principal precursors.
Their movement may be styled thus: a reaction against the Greco-
Latin spirit and the scholastic organisation of painting after the second
Renaissance and the Italo-French school of Fontainebleau, by the century
of Louis XIV., the school of Rome, and the consular and imperial taste.
In this sense Impressionism is a protest analogous to that of
Romanticism, exclaiming, to quote the old verse: “Qui nous délivrera
des Grecs et des Romains?”1 From this point of view Impressionism has
also great affinities with the ideas of the English Pre-Raphaelites, who
stepped across the second and even the first Renaissance back to the
Primitives.
This reaction is superimposed by another: the reaction of
Impressionism, not only against classic subjects, but against the black
painting of the degenerate Romanticists. And these two reactions are
counterbalanced by a return to the French ideal, to the realistic and
characteristic tradition which commences with Jean Foucquet and
Clouet, and is continued by Chardin, Claude Lorrain, Poussin, Watteau,
La Tour, Fragonard, and the admirable engravers of the eighteenth
century down to the final triumph of the allegorical taste of the Roman
revolution. Here can be found a whole chain of truly national artists who
have either been misjudged, like Chardin, or considered as “small
masters” and excluded from the first rank for the benefit of the pompous
Allegorists descended from the Italian school.
Impressionism being beyond all a technical reaction, its predecessors
should first be looked for from this material point of view. Watteau is the
most striking of all. L’Embarquement pour Cythère is, in its technique,
an Impressionist canvas. It embodies the most significant of all the
principles exposed by Claude Monet: the division of tones by juxtaposed
touches of colour which, at a certain distance, produce upon the eye of
the beholder the effect of the actual colouring of the things painted, with
a variety, a freshness and a delicacy of analysis unobtainable by a single
tone prepared and mixed upon the palette.

MANET — YOUNG MAN IN COSTUME OF MAJO

Claude Lorrain, and after him Carle Vernet, are claimed by the
Impressionists as precursors from the point of view of decorative
landscape arrangement, and particularly of the predominance of light in
which all objects are bathed. Ruysdael and Poussin are, in their eyes, for
the same reasons precursors, especially Ruysdael, who observed so
frankly the blue colouring of the horizon and the influence of blue upon
the landscape. It is known that Turner worshipped Claude for the very
same reasons. The Impressionists in their turn, consider Turner as one of
their masters; they have the greatest admiration for this mighty genius,
this sumptuous visionary. They have it equally for Bonington, whose
technique is inspired by the same observations as their own. They find,
finally, in Delacroix the frequent and very apparent application of their
ideas. Notably in the famous Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople,
the fair woman kneeling in the foreground is painted in accordance with
the principles of the division of tones: the nude back is furrowed with
blue, green and yellow touches, the juxtaposition of which produces, at a
certain distance, an admirable flesh-tone.
And now I must speak at some length of a painter who, together with
the luminous and sparkling landscapist Félix Ziem, was the most direct
initiator of Impressionist technique. Monticelli is one of those singular
men of genius who are not connected with any school, and whose work
is an inexhaustible source of applications. He lived at Marseilles, where
he was born, made a short appearance at the Salons, and then returned to
his native town, where he died poor, ignored, paralysed and mad. In
order to live he sold his small pictures at the cafés, where they fetched
ten or twenty francs at the most. To-day they sell for considerable prices,
although the government has not yet acquired any work by Monticelli for
the public galleries. The mysterious power alone of these paintings
secures him a fame which is, alas! posthumous. Many Monticellis have
been sold by dealers as Diaz’s; now they are more eagerly looked for
than Diaz, and collectors have made fortunes with these small canvases
bought formerly, to use a colloquial expression which is here only too
literally true, “for a piece of bread.”
Monticelli painted landscapes, romantic scenes, “fêtes galantes” in the
spirit of Watteau, and still-life pictures: one could not imagine a more
inspired sense of colour than shown by these works which seem to be
painted with crushed jewels, with powerful harmony, and beyond all
with an unheard-of delicacy in the perception of fine shades. There are
tones which nobody had ever invented yet, a richness, a profusion, a
subtlety which almost vie with the resources of music. The fairyland
atmosphere of these works surrounds a very firm design of charming
style, but, to use the words of the artist himself, “in these canvases the
objects are the decoration, the touches are the scales, and the light is the
tenor.” Monticelli has created for himself an entirely personal technique
which can only be compared with that of Turner; he painted with a brush
so full, fat and rich, that some of the details are often truly modelled in
relief, in a substance as precious as enamels, jewels, ceramics — a
substance which is a delight in itself. Every picture by Monticelli
provokes astonishment; constructed upon one colour as upon a musical
theme, it rises to intensities which one would have thought impossible.
His pictures are magnificent bouquets, bursts of joy and colour, where
nothing is ever crude, and where everything is ruled by a supreme sense
of harmony.

MANET — THE READER

Claude Lorrain, Watteau, Turner and Monticelli constitute really the
descent of a landscapist like Claude Monet. In all matters concerning
technique, they form the direct chain of Impressionism. As regards
design, subject, realism, the study of modern life, the conception of
beauty and the portrait, the Impressionist movement is based upon the
old French masters, principally upon Chardin, Watteau, Latour,
Largillière, Fragonard, Debucourt, Saint-Aubin, Moreau, and Eisen. It
has resolutely held aloof from mythology, academic allegory, historical
painting, and from the neo-Greek elements of Classicism as well as from
the German and Spanish elements of Romanticism. This reactionary
movement is therefore entirely French, and surely if it deserves reproach,
the one least deserved is that levelled upon it by the official painters:
disobedience to the national spirit. Impressionism is an art which does
not give much scope to intellectuality, an art whose followers admit
scarcely anything but immediate vision, rejecting philosophy and
symbols and occupying themselves only with the consideration of light,
picturesqueness, keen and clever observation, and antipathy to
abstraction, as the innate qualities of French art. We shall see later on,
when considering separately its principal masters, that each of them has
based his art upon some masters of pure French blood.
Impressionism has, then, hitherto been very badly judged. It is
contained in two chief points: search after a new technique, and
expression of modern reality. Its birth has not been a spontaneous
phenomenon. Manet, who, by his spirit and by the chance of his
friendships, grouped around him the principal members, commenced by
being classed in the ranks of the Realists of the second Romanticism by
the side of Courbet; and during the whole first period of his work he only
endeavoured to describe contemporary scenes, at a time when the laws of
the new technique were already dawning upon Claude Monet. Gradually
the grouping of the Impressionists took place. Claude Monet is really the
first initiator: in a parallel line with his ideas and his works Manet passed
into the second period of his artistic life, and with him Renoir, Degas and
Pissarro. But Manet had already during his first period been the topic of
far-echoing polemics, caused by his realism and by the marked influence
of the Spaniards and of Hals upon his style; his temperament, too, was
that of the head of a school; and for these reasons legend has attached to
his name the title of head of the Impressionist school, but this legend is
incorrect.
To conclude, the very name “Impressionism” is due to Claude Monet.
There has been much serious arguing upon this famous word which has
given rise to all sorts of definitions and conclusions. In reality this is its
curious origin which is little known, even in criticism. Ever since 1860
the works of Manet and of his friends caused such a stir, that they were
rejected en bloc by the Salon jury of 1863. The emperor, inspired by a
praiseworthy, liberal thought, demanded that these innovators should at
least have the right to exhibit together in a special room which was
called the Salon des Refusés. The public crowded there to have a good
laugh. One of the pictures which caused most derision was a sunset by
Claude Monet, entitled Impressions. From this moment the painters who
adopted more or less the same manner were called Impressionists. The
word remained in use, and Manet and his friends thought it a matter of
indifference whether this label was attached to them, or another. At this
despised Salon were to be found the names of Manet, Monet, Whistler,
Bracquemont, Jongkind, Fantin-Latour, Renoir, Legros, and many others
who have since risen to fame. Universal ridicule only fortified the
friendships and resolutions of this group of men, and from that time
dates the definite foundation of the Impressionist school. For thirty years
it continued to produce without interruption an enormous quantity of
works under an accidental and inexact denomination; to obey the
creative instinct, without any other dogma than the passionate
observation of nature, without any other assistance than individual
sympathies, in the face of the disciplinary teaching of the official school.

DEGAS — THE DANCER AT THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S

 II THE THEORY OF THE
IMPRESSIONISTS
THE DIVISION OF TONES, COMPLEMENTARY COLOURS, THE STUDY OF
ATMOSPHERE — THE IDEAS OF THE IMPRESSIONISTS ON SUBJECT-PICTURES, ON
THE BEAUTY OF CHARACTER, ON MODERNITY, AND ON STYLE

It should be stated from the outset that there is nothing dogmatic about
this explanation of the Impressionist theories, and that it is not the result
of a preconceived plan. In art a system is not improvised. A theory is
slowly evolved, nearly always unknown to the author, from the
discoveries of his sincere instinct, and this theory can only be formulated
after years by criticism facing the works. Monet and Manet have worked
for a long time without ever thinking that theories would be built upon
their paintings. Yet a certain number of considerations will strike the
close observer, and I will put these considerations before the reader, after
reminding him that spontaneity and feeling are the essentials of all art.

DEGAS — CARRIAGES AT THE RACES

The Impressionist ideas may be summed up in the following manner:
—
In nature no colour exists by itself. The colouring of the objects is a
pure illusion: the only creative source of colour is the sunlight which
envelopes all things, and reveals them, according to the hours, with
infinite modifications. The mystery of matter escapes us; we do not
know the exact moment when reality separates itself from unreality. All
we know is, that our vision has formed the habit of discerning in the
universe two notions: form and colour; but these two notions are
inseparable. Only artificially can we distinguish between outline and
colour: in nature the distinction does not exist. Light reveals the forms,
and, playing upon the different states of matter, the substance of leaves,
the grain of stones, the fluidity of air in deep layers, gives them
dissimilar colouring. If the light disappears, forms and colours vanish
together. We only see colours; everything has a colour, and it is by the
perception of the different colour surfaces striking our eyes, that we
conceive the forms, i.e. the outlines of these colours.
The idea of distance, of perspective, of volume is given us by darker
or lighter colours: this idea is what is called in painting the sense of
values. A value is the degree of dark or light intensity, which permits our
eyes to comprehend that one object is further or nearer than another. And
as painting is not and cannot be the imitation of nature, but merely her
artificial interpretation, since it only has at its disposal two out of three
dimensions, the values are the only means that remain for expressing
depth on a flat surface.
Colour is therefore the procreatrix of design. Or, colour being simply
the irradiation of light, it follows that all colour is composed of the same
elements as sunlight, namely the seven tones of the spectrum. It is
known, that these seven tones appear different owing to the unequal
speed of the waves of light. The tones of nature appear to us therefore
different, like those of the spectrum, and for the same reason. The
colours vary with the intensity of light. There is no colour peculiar to any
object, but only more or less rapid vibration of light upon its surface. The
speed depends, as is demonstrated by optics, on the degree of the
inclination of the rays which, according to their vertical or oblique
direction, give different light and colour.
The colours of the spectrum are thus recomposed in everything we see.
It is their relative proportion which makes new tones out of the seven
spectral tones. This leads immediately to some practical conclusions, the
first of which is, that what has formerly been called local colour is an
error: a leaf is not green, a tree-trunk is not brown, and, according to the
time of day, i.e. according to the greater or smaller inclination of the rays
(scientifically called the angle of incidence), the green of the leaf and the
brown of the tree are modified. What has to be studied therefore in these
objects, if one wishes to recall their colour to the beholder of a picture, is
the composition of the atmosphere which separates them from the eye.
This atmosphere is the real subject of the picture, and whatever is
represented upon it only exists through its medium.

DEGAS — THE GREEK DANCE — PASTEL

A second consequence of this analysis of light is, that shadow is not
absence of light, but light of a different quality and of different value.
Shadow is not a part of the landscape, where light ceases, but where it is
subordinated to a light which appears to us more intense. In the shadow
the rays of the spectrum vibrate with different speed. Painting should
therefore try to discover here, as in the light parts, the play of the atoms
of solar light, instead of representing shadows with ready-made tones
composed of bitumen and black.
The third conclusion resulting from this: the colours in the shadow are
modified by refraction. That means, f.i. in a picture representing an
interior, the source of light (window) may not be indicated: the light
circling round the picture will then be composed of the reflections of
rays whose source is invisible, and all the objects, acting as mirrors for
these reflections, will consequently influence each other. Their colours
will affect each other, even if the surfaces be dull. A red vase placed
upon a blue carpet will lead to a very subtle, but mathematically exact,
interchange between this blue and this red, and this exchange of
luminous waves will create between the two colours a tone of reflections
composed of both. These composite reflections will form a scale of tones
complementary of the two principal colours. The science of optics can
work out these complementary colours with mathematical exactness. If
f.i. a head receives the orange rays of daylight from one side and the
bluish light of an interior from the other, green reflections will
necessarily appear on the nose and in the middle region of the face. The
painter Besnard, who has specially devoted himself to this minute study
of complementary colours, has given us some famous examples of it.
The last consequence of these propositions is that the blending of the
spectral tones is accomplished by a parallel and distinct projection of the
colours. They are artificially reunited on the crystalline: a lens interposed
between the light and the eye, and opposing the crystalline, which is a
living lens, dissociates again these united rays, and shows us again the
seven distinct colours of the atmosphere. It is no less artificial if a painter
mixes upon his palette different colours to compose a tone; it is again
artificial that paints have been invented which represent some of the
combinations of the spectrum, just to save the artist the trouble of
constantly mixing the seven solar tones. Such mixtures are false, and
they have the disadvantage of creating heavy tonalities, since the coarse
mixture of powders and oils cannot accomplish the action of light which
reunites the luminous waves into an intense white of unimpaired
transparency. The colours mixed on the palette compose a dirty grey.
What, then, is the painter to do, who is anxious to approach, as near as
our poor human means will allow, that divine fairyland of nature? Here
we touch upon the very foundations of Impressionism. The painter will
have to paint with only the seven colours of the spectrum, and discard all
the others: that is what Claude Monet has done boldly, adding to them
only white and black. He will, furthermore, instead of composing
mixtures on his palette, place upon his canvas touches of none but the
seven colours juxtaposed, and leave the individual rays of each of these
colours to blend at a certain distance, so as to act like sunlight itself upon
the eye of the beholder.
 DEGAS — WAITING
This, then, is the theory of the dissociation of tones, which is the main
point of Impressionist technique. It has the immense advantage of
suppressing all mixtures, of leaving to each colour its proper strength,
and consequently its freshness and brilliancy. At the same time the
difficulties are extreme. The painter’s eye must be admirably subtle.
Light becomes the sole subject of the picture; the interest of the object
upon which it plays is secondary. Painting thus conceived becomes a
purely optic art, a search for harmonies, a sort of natural poem, quite
distinct from expression, style and design, which were the principal aims
of former painting. It is almost necessary to invent another name for this
special art which, clearly pictorial though it be, comes as near to music,
as it gets far away from literature and psychology. It is only natural that,
fascinated by this study, the Impressionists have almost remained
strangers to the painting of expression, and altogether hostile to historical
and symbolist painting. It is therefore principally in landscape painting
that they have achieved the greatness that is theirs.
Through the application of these principles which I have set forth very
summarily, Claude Monet arrived at painting by means of the infinitely
varied juxtaposition of a quantity of colour spots which dissociate the
tones of the spectrum and draw the forms of objects through the
arabesque of their vibrations. A landscape thus conceived becomes a
kind of symphony, starting from one theme (the most luminous point,
f.i.), and developing all over the canvas the variations of this theme. This
investigation is added to the habitual preoccupations of the landscapist
study of the character peculiar to the scene, style of the trees or houses,
accentuation of the decorative side — and to the habitual preoccupations
of the figure painter in the portrait. The canvases of Monet, Renoir and
Pissarro have, in consequence of this research, an absolutely original
aspect: their shadows are striped with blue, rose-madder and green;
nothing is opaque or sooty; a light vibration strikes the eye. Finally, blue
and orange predominate, simply because in these studies — which are
more often than not full sunlight effects — blue is the complementary
colour of the orange light of the sun, and is profusely distributed in the
shadows. In these canvases can be found a vast amount of exact grades
of tone, which seem to have been entirely ignored by the older painters,
whose principal concern was style, and who reduced a landscape to three
or four broad tones, endeavouring only to explain the sentiment inspired
by it.
And now I shall have to pass on to the Impressionists’ ideas on the
style itself of painting, on Realism.
From the outset it must not be forgotten that Impressionism has been
propagated by men who had all been Realists; that means by a
reactionary movement against classic and romantic painting. This
movement, of which Courbet will always remain the most famous
representative, has been anti-intellectual. It has protested against every
literary, psychologic or symbolical element in painting. It has reacted at
the same time against the historical painting of Delaroche and the
mythological painting of the Ecole de Rome, with an extreme violence
which appears to us excessive now, but which found its explanation in
the intolerable tediousness or emphasis at which the official painters had
arrived. Courbet was a magnificent worker, with rudimentary ideas, and
he endeavoured to exclude even those which he possessed. This
exaggeration which diminishes our admiration for his work and prevents
us from finding in it any emotion but that which results from technical
mastery, was salutary for the development of the art of his successors. It
caused the young painters to turn resolutely towards the aspects of
contemporary life, and to draw style and emotion from their own epoch;
and this intention was right. An artistic tradition is not continued by
imitating the style of the past, but by extracting the immediate
impression of each epoch. That is what the really great masters have
done, and it is the succession of their sincere and profound observations
which constitutes the style of the races.
 CLAUDE MONET — THE PINES
Manet and his friends drew all their strength from this idea. Much
finer and more learned than a man like Courbet, they saw an aspect of
modernity far more complex, and less limited to immediate and grossly
superficial realism. Nor must it be forgotten that they were
contemporaries of the realistic, anti-romantic literary movement, a
movement which gave them nothing but friends. Flaubert and the
Goncourts proved that Realism is not the enemy of refined form and of
delicate psychology. The influence of these ideas created first of all
Manet and his friends: the technical evolution (of which we have traced
the chief traits) came only much later to oppose itself to their
conceptions. Impressionism can therefore be defined as a revolution of
pictorial technique together with an attempt at expressing modernity.
The reaction against Symbolism and Romanticism happened to coincide
with the reaction against muddy technique.
The Impressionists, whilst occupying themselves with cleansing the
palette of the bitumen of which the Academy made exaggerated use,
whilst also observing nature with a greater love of light, made it their
object to escape in the representation of human beings the laws of
beauty, such as were taught by the School. And on this point one might
apply to them all that one knows of the ideas of the Goncourts and
Flaubert, and later of Zola, in the domain of the novel. They were moved
by the same ideas; to speak of the one group is to speak of the other. The
longing for truth, the horror of emphasis and of false idealism which
paralysed the novelist as well as the painter, led the Impressionists to
substitute for beauty a novel notion, that of character. To search for, and
to express, the true character of a being or of a site, seemed to them more
significant, more moving, than to search for an exclusive beauty, based
upon rules, and inspired by the Greco-Latin ideal. Like the Flemings, the
Germans, the Spaniards, and in opposition to the Italians whose
influence had conquered all the European academies, the French Realist-
Impressionists, relying upon the qualities of lightness, sincerity and
expressive clearness which are the real merits of their race, detached
themselves from the oppressive and narrow preoccupation with the
beautiful and with all the metaphysics and abstractions following in its
train.

CLAUDE MONET — CHURCH AT VERNON

This fact of the substitution of character for beauty is the essential
feature of the movement. What is called Impressionism is — let it not be
forgotten — a technique which can be applied to any subject. Whether
the subject be a virgin, or a labourer, it can be painted with divided tones,
and certain living artists, like the symbolist Henri Martin, who has
almost the ideas of a Pre-Raphaelite, have proved it by employing this
technique for the rendering of religious or philosophic subjects. But one
can only understand the effort and the faults of the painters grouped
around Manet, by constantly recalling to one’s mind their predeliction
for character. Before Manet a distinction was made between noble
subjects, and others which were relegated to the domain of genre in
which no great artist was admitted to exist by the School, the familiarity
of their subjects barring from them this rank. By the suppression of the
nobleness inherent to the treated subject, the painter’s technical merit is
one of the first things to be considered in giving him rank. The Realist-
Impressionists painted scenes in the ball-room, on the river, in the field,
the street, the foundry, modern interiors, and found in the life of the
humble immense scope for studying the gestures, the costumes, the
expressions of the nineteenth century.
Their effort had its bearing upon the way of representing persons,
upon what is called, in the studio language, the “mise en cadre.” There,
too, they overthrew the principles admitted by the School. Manet, and
especially Degas, have created in this respect a new style from which the
whole art of realistic contemporary illustration is derived. This style had
been hitherto totally ignored, or the artists had shrunk from applying it. It
is a style which is founded upon the small painters of the eighteenth
century, upon Saint-Aubin, Debucourt, Moreau, and, further back, upon
Pater and the Dutchmen. But this time, instead of confining this style to
vignettes and very small dimensions, the Impressionists have boldly
given it the dimensions and importance of big canvases. They have no
longer based the laws of composition, and consequently of style, upon
the ideas relative to the subjects, but upon values and harmonies. To take
a summary example: if the School composed a picture representing the
death of Agamemnon, it did not fail to subordinate the whole
composition to Agamemnon, then to Clytemnestra, then to the witnesses
of the murder, graduating the moral and literary interest according to the
different persons, and sacrificing to this interest the colouring and the
realistic qualities of the scene. The Realists composed by picking out
first the strongest “value” of the picture, say a red dress, and then
distributing the other values according to a harmonious progression of
their tonalities. “The principal person in a picture,” said Manet, “is the
light.” With Manet and his friends we find, then, that the concern for
expression and for the sentiments evoked by the subject, was always
subordinated to a purely pictorial and decorative preoccupation. This has
frequently led the Impressionists to grave errors, which they have,
however, generally avoided by confining themselves to very simple
subjects, for which the daily life supplied the grouping.
 RENOIR — PORTRAIT OF MADAME MAITRE
One of the reforms due to their conception has been the suppression of
the professional model, and the substitution for it of the natural model,
seen in the exercise of his occupation. This is one of the most useful
conquests for the benefit of modern painting. It marks a just return to
nature and simplicity. Nearly all their figures are real portraits; and in
everything that concerns the labourer and the peasant, they have found
the proper style and character, because they have observed these beings
in the true medium of their occupations, instead of forcing them into a
sham pose and painting them in disguise. The basis of all their pictures
has been first of all a series of landscape and figure studies made in the
open air, far from the studio, and afterwards co-ordinated. One may wish
pictorial art to have higher ambitions; and one may find in the Primitives
an example of a curious mysticism, an expression of the abstract and of
dreams. But one should not underrate the power of naïve and realistic
observation, which the Primitives carried into the execution of their
works, subordinating it, however, to religious expression, and it must
also be admitted that the Realist-Impressionists served at least their
conception of art logically and homogeneously. The criticism which may
be levelled against them is that which Realism itself carries in its train,
and we shall see that esthetics could never create classifications capable
of defining and containing the infinite gradations of creative
temperaments.
In art, classifications have rarely any value, and are rather damaging.
Realism and Idealism are abstract terms which cannot suffice to
characterise beings who obey their sensibility. It is therefore necessary to
invent as many words as there are remarkable men. If Leonardo was a
great painter, are Turner and Monet not painters at all? There is no
connection between them; their methods of thought and expression are
antithetical. Perhaps it will be most simple, to admire them all, and to
renounce any further definition of the painter, adopting this word to mark
the man who uses the palette as his means of expression.
Thus preoccupation with contemporary emotions, substitution of
character for classic beauty (or of emotional beauty for formal beauty),
admission of the genre-painter into the first rank, composition based
upon the reciprocal reaction of values, subordination of the subject to the
interest of execution, the effort to isolate the art of painting from the
ideas inherent to that of literature, and particularly the instinctive move
towards the “symphonisation” of colours, and consequently towards
music, — these are the principal features of the aesthetic code of the
Realist-Impressionists, if this term may be applied to a group of men
hostile towards esthetics such as they are generally taught.
 III EDOUARD MANET: HIS WORK, HIS
INFLUENCE

As I have said, Edouard Manet has not been entirely the originator of the
Impressionist technique. It is the work of Claude Monet which presents
the most complete example of it, and which also came first as regards
date. But it is very difficult to determine such cases of priority, and it is,
after all, rather useless. A technique cannot be invented in a day. In this
case it was the result of long investigations, in which Manet and Renoir
participated, and it is necessary to unite under the collective name of
Impressionists a group of men, tied by friendship, who made a
simultaneous effort towards originality, all in about the same spirit,
though frequently in very different ways. As in the case of the Pre-
Raphaelites, it was first of all friendship, then unjust derision, which
created the solidarity of the Impressionists. But the Pre-Raphaelites, in
aiming at an idealistic and symbolic art, were better agreed upon the
intellectual principles which permitted them at once to define a
programme. The Impressionists who were only united by their
temperaments, and had made it their first aim to break away from all
school programmes, tried simply to do something new, with frankness
and freedom.
Manet was, in their midst, the personality marked out at the same time
by their admiration, and by the attacks of the critics for the post of
standard-bearer. A little older than his friends, he had already, quite
alone, raised heated discussions by the works in his first manner. He was
considered an innovator, and it was by instinctive admiration that his
first friends, Whistler, Legros, and Fantin-Latour, were gradually joined
by Marcelin Desboutin, Degas, Renoir, Monet, Pissarro, Caillebotte,
Berthe Morisot, the young painter Bazille, who met his premature death
in 1870, and by the writers Gautier, Banville, Baudelaire (who was a
passionate admirer of Manet’s); then later by Zola, the Goncourts, and
Stéphane Mallarmé. This was the first nucleus of a public which was to
increase year by year. Manet had the personal qualities of a chief; he was
a man of spirit, an ardent worker, and an enthusiastic and generous
character.
 MANET — THE DEAD TOREADOR
Manet commenced his first studies with Couture. After having
travelled a good deal at sea to obey his parents, his vocation took hold of
him irresistibly. About 1850 the young man entered the studio of the
severe author of the Romains de la Décadence. His stay was short. He
displeased the professor by his uncompromising energy. Couture said of
him angrily: “He will become the Daumier of 1860.” It is known that
Daumier, lithographer, and painter of genius, was held in meagre esteem
by the academicians. Manet travelled in Germany after the coup d’etat,
copied Rembrandt in Munich, then went to Italy, copied Tintoretto in
Venice, and conceived there the idea of several religious pictures. Then
he became enthusiastic about the Spaniards, especially Velasquez and
Goya. The sincere expression of things seen took root from this moment
as the principal rule of art in the brain of this young Frenchman who was
loyal, ardent, and hostile to all subtleties. He painted some fine works,
like the Buveur d’absinthe and the Vieux musicien. They show the
influence of Courbet, but already the blacks and the greys have an
original and superb quality; they announce a virtuoso of the first order.
It was in 1861 that Manet first sent to the Salon the portraits of his
parents and the Guitarero, which was hailed by Gautier, and rewarded by
the jury, though it roused surprise and irritation. But after that he was
rejected, whether it was a question of the Fifre or of the Déjeuner sur
l’herbe. This canvas, with an admirable feminine nude, created a
scandal, because an undressed woman figured in it amidst clothed
figures, a matter of frequent occurrence with the masters of the
Renaissance. The landscape is not painted in the open air, but in the
studio, and resembles a tapestry, but it shows already the most brilliant
evidence of Manet’s talent in the study of the nude and the still-life of the
foreground, which is the work of a powerful master. From the time of
this canvas the artist’s personality appeared in all its maturity. He painted
it before he was thirty, and it has the air of an old master’s work; it is
based upon Hals and the Spaniards together.
The reputation of Manet became established after 1865. Furious critics
were opposed by enthusiastic admirers. Baudelaire upheld Manet, as he
had upheld Delacroix and Wagner, with his great clairvoyance,
sympathetic to all real originality. The Olympia brought the discussion to
a head. This courtesan lying in bed undressed, with a negress carrying a
bouquet, and a black cat, made a tremendous stir. It is a powerful work
of strong colour, broad design and intense sentiment, astounding in its
parti-pris of reducing the values to the greatest simplicity. One can feel
in it the artist’s preoccupation with rediscovering the rude frankness of
Hals and Goya, and his aversion against the prettiness and false nobility
of the school. This famous Olympia which occasioned so much fury,
appears to us to-day as a transition work. It is neither a masterpiece, nor
an emotional work, but a technical experiment, very significant for the
epoch during which it appeared in French art, and this canvas, which is
very inferior to Manet’s fine works, may well be considered as a date of
evolution. He was doubtful about exhibiting it, but Baudelaire decided
him and wrote to him on this occasion these typical remarks: “You
complain about attacks? But are you the first to endure them? Have you
more genius than Chateaubriand and Wagner? They were not killed by
derision. And, in order not to make you too proud, I must tell you, that
they are models each in his own way and in a very rich world, whilst you
are only the first in the decrepitude of your art.”
 MANET — OLYMPIA
Thus it must be firmly established that from this moment Manet
passed as an innovator, years before Impressionism existed or was even
thought of. This is an important point: it will help to clear up the twofold
origin of the movement which followed. To his realism, to his return to
composition in the modern spirit, and to the simplifying of planes and
values, Manet owed these attacks, though at that time his colour was still
sombre and entirely influenced by Hals, Goya and Courbet. From that
time the artist became a chief. As his friends used to meet him at an
obscure Batignolles café, the café Guerbois (still existing), public
derision baptized these meetings with the name of “L’Ecole des
Batignolles.” Manet then exhibited the Angels at the Tomb of Christ, a
souvenir of the Venetians; Lola de Valence, commented upon by
Baudelaire in a quatrain which can be found in the Fleurs du Mal; the
Episode d’un combat de taureaux (dissatisfied with this picture, he cut
out the dead toreador in the foreground, and burnt the rest). The Acteur
tragique (portrait of Rouvière in Hamlet) and the Jésus insulté followed,
and then came the Gitanos, L’Enfant à l’Epée, and the portrait of Mme.
Manet. This series of works is admirable. It is here where he reveals
himself as a splendid colourist, whose design is as vigorous as the
technique is masterly. In these works one does not think of looking for
anything but the witchery of technical strength; and the abundant wealth
of his temperament is simply dazzling. Manet reveals himself as the
direct heir of the great Spaniards, more interesting, more spontaneous,
and freer than Courbet. The Rouvière is as fine a symphony in grey and
black as the noblest portraits by Bronzino, and there is probably no Goya
more powerful than the Toréador tué. Manet’s altogether classic descent
appears here undeniably. There is no question yet of Impressionism, and
yet Monet and Renoir are already painting, Monet has exhibited at the
Salon des Refusés, but criticism sees and attacks nobody but Manet. This
great individuality who overwhelmed the Academy with its weak
allegories, was the butt of great insults and the object of great
admiration. Banished from the Salons, he collected fifty pictures in a
room in the Avenue de l’Alma and invited the public thither. In 1868
appeared the portrait of Emile Zola, in 1860 the Déjeuner, works which
are so powerful, that they enforced admiration in spite of all hostility. In
the Salon of 1870 was shown the portrait of Eva Gonzalès, the charming
pastellist and pupil of Manet, and the impressive Execution of
Maximilian at Queretaro. Manet was at the apogee of his talent, when
the Franco-German war broke out. At the age of thirty-eight he had put
forth a considerable amount of work, tried himself in all styles, severed
his individuality from the slavish admiration of the old masters, and
attained his own mastery. And now he wanted to expand, and, in joining
Monet, Renoir and Degas, interpret in his own way the Impressionist
theory.

MANET — THE WOMAN WITH THE PARROT

The Fight of the Kearsage and the Alabama, a magnificent sea-piece,
bathed in sunlight, announced this transformation in his work, as did also
a study, a Garden, painted, I believe, in 1870, but exhibited only after the
crisis of the terrible year. At that time the Durand-Ruel Gallery bought a
considerable series by the innovator, and was imitated by some select
art-lovers. The Musique aux Tuileries and the Bal de l’Opéra had, some
years before, pointed towards the evolution of this great artist in the
direction of plein-air painting. The Bon Bock, in which the very soul of
Hals is revived, and the grave Liseur, sold immediately at Vienne, were
the two last pledges given by the artist to his old admirers; these two
pictures had moreover a splendid success, and the Bon Bock, popularised
by an engraving, was hailed by the very men who had most unjustly
attacked the author of the portrait of Mme. Morisot, a French
masterpiece. But already Manet was attracted irresistibly towards the
study of light, and, faithful to his programme, he prepared to face once
again outbursts of anger and further sarcasms; he was resolved once
again to offer battle to the Salons. Followed by all the Impressionists he
tried to make them understand the necessity of introducing the new ideas
into this retrograde Milieu. But they would not. Having already received
a rebuff by the attacks directed for some years against their works, they
exhibited among themselves in some private galleries: they declined to
force the gate of the Salons, and Manet remained alone. In 1875 he
submitted, with his Argenteuil, the most perfect epitome of his
atmospheric researches. The jury admitted it in spite of loud protests:
they were afraid of Manet; they admired his power of transformation,
and he revolted the prejudiced, attracting them at the same time by the
charm of his force. But in 1876 the portrait of Desboutin and the Linge
(an exquisite picture, — one of the best productions of open-air study)
were rejected. Manet then recommenced the experience of 1867, and
opened his studio to the public. A register at the door was soon covered
with signatures protesting against the jury, as well as with hostile jokes,
and even anonymous insults! In 1877 the defeated jury admitted the
portrait of the famous singer Faure in the part of Hamlet, and rejected
Nana, a picture which was found scandalising, but has charming
freshness and an intensely modern character. In 1878, 1879 and 1880
they accepted la Serre, the surprising symphony in blue and white which
shows Mr George Moore in boating costume, the portrait of Antonin
Proust, and the scene at the Père Lathuile restaurant, in which Manet’s
nervous and luminous realism has so curious a resemblance to the art of
the Goncourts. In 1881 the portrait of Rochefort and that of the lion-
killer, Pertuiset, procured the artist a medal at the Salon, and Antonin
Proust, the friend of Manet’s childhood, who had become Minister of
Fine Arts, honoured himself in decorating him with the legion of honour.
In 1882 appeared a magnificent canvas, the Bar des Folies-Bergère, in
which there is some sparkling still-life painting of most attractive beauty.
It was accompanied by a lady’s portrait, Jeanne. But on April 30, 1883,
Manet died, exhausted by his work and struggles, of locomotor ataxy,
after having vainly undergone the amputation of a foot to avoid
gangrene.
 MANET — THE BAR AT THE FOLIES-BERGÈRE
It will be seen that Manet fought through all his life: few artists’ lives
have been nobler. His has been an example of untiring energy; he
employed it as much in working, as in making a stand against prejudices.
Rejected, accepted, rejected again, he delivered with enormous courage
and faith his attack upon a jury which represented routine. As he fought
in front of his easel, he still fought before the public, without ever
relaxing, without changing, alone, apart even from those whom he loved,
who had been shaped by his example. This great painter, one of those
who did most honour to the French soul, had the genius to create by
himself an Impressionism of his own which will always remain his own,
after having given evidence of gifts of the first order in the tradition
handed down by the masters of the real and the good. He cannot be
confused either with Monet, or with Pissarro and Renoir. His
comprehension of light is a special one, his technique is not in
accordance with the system of colour-spots; it observes the theory of
complementary colours and of the division of tones without departing
from a grand style, from a classic stateliness, from a superb sureness.
Manet has not been the inventor of Impressionism which co-existed with
his work since 1865, but he has rendered it immense services, by taking
upon himself all the outbursts of anger addressed to the innovators, by
making a breach in public opinion, through which his friends have
passed in behind him. Probably without him all these artists would have
remained unknown, or at least without influence, because they all were
bold characters in art, but timid or disdainful in life. Degas, Monet and
Renoir were fine natures with a horror of polemics, who wished to hold
aloof from the Salons, and were resigned from the outset to be
misunderstood. They were, so to say, electrified by the magnificent
example of Manet’s fighting spirit, and Manet was generous enough to
take upon himself the reproaches levelled, not only against his work, but
against theirs. His twenty years of open war, sustained with an
abnegation worthy of all esteem, must be considered as one of the most
significant phenomena of the history of the artists of all ages.
This work of Manet, so much discussed and produced under such
tormenting conditions, owes its importance beyond all to its power and
frankness. Ten years of developing the first manner, tragically limited by
the war of 1870; thirteen years of developing the second evolution,
parallel with the efforts of the Impressionists. The period from 1860 to
1870 is logically connected with Hals and Goya; from 1870 to 1883 the
artist’s modernity is complicated by the study of light. His personality
appears there even more original, but one may well give the palm to
those works of Manet which are painted in his classic and low-toned
manner. He had all the pictorial gifts which make the glory of the
masters: full, true, broad composition, colouring of irresistible power,
blacks and greys which cannot be found elsewhere since Velasquez and
Goya, and a profound knowledge of values. He has tried his hand at
everything: portraits, landscapes, seascapes, scenes of modern life, still-
life and nudes have each in their turn served his ardent desire of creation.
His was a much finer comprehension of contemporary life than seems to
be admitted by Realism: one has only to compare him with Courbet, to
see how far more nervous and intelligent he was, without loss to the
qualities of truth and robustness. His pictures will always remain
documents of the greatest importance on the society, the manners and
customs of the second Empire. He did not possess the gift of psychology.
His Christ aux Anges and Jésus insulté are obviously only pieces of
painting without idealism. He was, like the great Dutch virtuosos, and
like certain Italians, more eye than soul. Yet his Maximilian, the
drawings to Poe’s Raven, and certain sketches show that he might have
realised some curious, psychological works, had he not been so
completely absorbed by the immediate reality and by the desire for
beautiful paint. A beautiful painter — this is what he was before
everything else, this is his fairest fame, and it is almost inconceivable
that the juries of the Salons failed to understand him. They waxed
indignant over his subjects which offer only a restricted interest, and they
did not see the altogether classic quality of this technique without
bitumen, without glazing, without tricks; of this vibrating colour; of this
rich paint; of this passionate design so suitable for expressing movement
and gestures true to life; of this simple composition where the whole
picture is based upon two or three values with the straightforwardness
one admires in Rubens, Jordaens and Hals.
 MANET — DÉJEUNER
Manet will occupy an important position in the French School. He is
the most original painter of the second half of the nineteenth century, the
one who has really created a great movement. His work, the fecundity of
which is astonishing, is unequal. One has to remember that, besides the
incessant strife which he kept up — a strife which would have killed
many artists — he had to find strength for two grave crises in himself.
He joined one movement, then freed himself of it, then invented another
and recommenced to learn painting at a point where anybody else would
have continued in his previous manner. “Each time I paint,” he said to
Mallarmé, “I throw myself into the water to learn swimming.” It is not
surprising that such a man should have been unequal, and that one can
distinguish in his work between experiments, exaggerations due to
research, and efforts made to reject the prejudices of which we feel the
weight no longer. But it would be unjust to say that Manet has only had
the merit of opening up new roads; that has been said to belittle him,
after it had first been said that these roads led into absurdity. Works like
the Toréador, Rouvière, Mme. Manet, the Déjeuner, the Musique aux
Tuileries, the Bon Bock, Argenteuil, Le Linge, En Bateau and the Bar,
will always remain admirable masterpieces which will do credit to
French painting, of which the spontaneous, living, clear and bold art of
Manet is a direct and very representative product.
 There remains, then, a great personality who knew how to dominate
the rather coarse conceptions of Realism, who influenced by his
modernity all contemporary illustration, who re-established a sound and
strong tradition in the face of the Academy, and who not only created a
new transition, but marked his place on the new road which he had
opened. To him Impressionism owes its existence; his tenacity enabled it
to take root and to vanquish the opposition of the School; his work has
enriched the world by some beautiful examples which demonstrate the
union of the two principles of Realism and of that technical
Impressionism which was to supply Manet, Renoir, Pissarro and Sisley
with an object for their efforts. For the sum total of all that is evoked by
his name, Edouard Manet certainly deserves the name of a man of genius
— an incomplete genius, though, since the thought with him was not on
the level of his technique, since he could never affect the emotions like a
Leonardo or a Rembrandt, but genius all the same through the
magnificent power of his gifts, the continuity of his style, and the
importance of his part which infused blood into a school dying of the
anaemia of conventional art. Whoever beholds a work of Manet’s, even
without knowing the conditions of his life, will feel that there is
something great, the lion’s claw which Delacroix had recognised as far
back as 1861, and to which, it is said, even the great Ingres had paid
homage on the jury which examined with disgust the Guitarero.
 MANET — PORTRAIT OF MADAME M.L.
To-day Manet is considered almost as a classic glory; and the progress
for which he had given the impulse, has been so rapid, that many are
astonished that he should ever have been considered audacious. Sight is
transformed, strife is extinguished, and a large, select public, familiar
with Monet and Renoir, judge Manet almost as a long defunct initiator.
One has to know his admirable life, one has to know well the incredible
inertia of the Salons where he appeared, to give him his full due. And
when, after the acceptance of Impressionism, the unavoidable reaction
will take place, Manet’s qualities of solidity, truth and science will
appear such, that he will survive many of those to whom he has opened
the road and facilitated the success at the expense of his own. It will be
seen that Degas and he have, more than the others, and with less
apparent éclat, united the gifts which produce durable works in the midst
of the fluctuations of fashion and the caprices of taste and views. Manet
can, at the Louvre or any other gallery, hold his own in the most crushing
surroundings, prove his personal qualities, and worthily represent a
period which he loved.
 An enormous amount has been written on him, from Zola’s bold and
intelligent pamphlet in 1865, to the recent work by M. Théodore Duret.
Few men have provoked more comments. In an admirable picture,
Hommage à Manet, the delicate and perfect painter Fantin-Latour, a
friend from the first hour, has grouped around the artist some of his
admirers, Monet, Renoir, Duranty, Zola, Bazille, and Braquemond. The
picture has to-day a place of honour at the Luxembourg, where Manet is
insufficiently represented by Olympia, a study of a woman, and the
Balcony. A collection is much to be desired of his lithographs, his
etchings and his pastels, in which he has proved his diversified mastery,
and also of his portraits of famous contemporaries, Zola, Rochefort,
Desboutin, Proust, Mallarmé, Clemenceau, Guys, Faure, Baudelaire,
Moore, and others, an admirable series by a visionary who possessed, in
a period of unrest and artificiality, the quality of rude sincerity, and the
love of truth of a Primitive.

MANET — THE HOTHOUSE

 IV EDGAR DEGAS: HIS WORK, HIS
INFLUENCE

I have said how vain it is to class artistic temperaments under a title

imposed upon them generally by circumstances and dates, rather than by
their own free will. The study of Degas will furnish additional proof for
it. Classed with the Impressionists, this master participates in their ideas
in the sphere of composition, rather than in that of colour. He belongs to
them through his modernity and comprehension of character. Only when
we come to his quite recent landscapes (1896), can we link him to Monet
and Renoir as colourist, and he has been more their friend than their
colleague.
Degas is known by the select few, and almost ignored by the public.
This is due to several reasons. Degas has never wished to exhibit at the
Salons, except, I believe, once or twice at the beginning of his career. He
has only shown his works at those special exhibitions arranged by the
Impressionists in hired apartments (rue le Peletier, rue Laffitte,
Boulevard des Capucines), and at some art-dealers. The art of Degas has
never had occasion to shock the public by the exuberance of its colour,
because he restricted himself to grey and quiet harmonies. Degas is a
modest character, fond of silence and solitude, with a horror of the crowd
and of controversies, and almost disinclined to show his works. He is a
man of intelligence and ready wit, whose sallies are dreaded; he is
almost a misanthrope. His pictures have been gradually sold to foreign
countries and dispersed in rich galleries without having been seen by the
public. His character is, in short, absolutely opposed to that of Manet,
who, though he suffered from criticism, thought it his duty to bid it
defiance. Degas’s influence has, however, been considerable, though
secretly so, and the young painters have been slowly inspired by his
example.
 DEGAS — THE BEGGAR WOMAN
Degas is beyond all a draughtsman of the first order. His spirit is quite
classical. He commenced by making admirable copies of the Italian
Primitives, notably of Fra Angelico, and the whole first series of his
works speaks of that influence: portraits, heads of deep, mat, amber
colour, on a ground of black or grey tones, remarkable for a severity of
intense style, and for the rare gift of psychological expression. To find
the equal of these faces — after having stated their classic descent —
one would have to turn to the beautiful things by Ingres, and certainly
Degas is, with Ingres, the most learned, the most perfect French
draughtsman of the nineteenth century. An affirmation of this nature is
made to surprise those who judge Impressionism with preconceived
ideas. It is none the less true that, if a series of Degas’s first portraits
were collected, the comparison would force itself upon one’s mind
irrefutably. In face of the idealist painting of Romanticism, Ingres
represented quite clearly the cult of painting for its own sake. His ideas
were mediocre, and went scarcely beyond the poor, conventional ideal of
the Academy; but his genius was so great, that it made him paint,
together with his tedious allegories, some incomparable portraits and
nudes. He thought he was serving official Classicism, which still boasts
of his name, but in reality he dominated it; and, whilst he was an imitator
of Raphael, he was a powerful Realist. The Impressionists admire him as
such, and agree with him in banishing from the art of painting all literary
imagination, whether it be the tedious mythology of the School, or the
historical anecdote of the Romanticists. Degas and Besnard admire
Ingres as colossal draughtsman, and, beyond all, as man who, in spite of
the limitations of his mind, preserved the clear vision of the mission of
his art at a time when art was used for the expression of literary
conceptions. Who would have believed it? Yet it is true, and Manet, too,
held the same view of Ingres, little as our present academicians may
think it! It happens that to-day Impressionism is more akin to Ingres than
to Delacroix, just as the young poets are more akin to Racine than to
Hugo. They reject the foreign elements, and search, before anything else,
for the strict national tradition. Degas follows Ingres and resembles him.
He is also reminiscent of the Primitives and of Holbein. There is, in his
first period, the somewhat dry and geometrical perfection, the somewhat
heavy colour which only serves to strengthen the correctness of the
planes. At the Exposition of 1900, there was a Degas which surprised
everybody. It was an Interior of a cotton factory in an American town.
This small picture was curiously clear: it would be impossible to paint
better and with a more accomplished knowledge of the laws of painting.
But it was the work of a soulless, emotionless Realist; it was a coloured
photograph of unheard-of truth, the mathematical science of which left
the beholder cold. This work, which is very old (it dates back to about
1860), gave no idea of what Degas has grown into. It was the work of an
unemotional master of technique; only just the infinitely delicate value of
the greys and blacks revealed the future master of harmony. One almost
might have wished to find a fault in this aggravating perfection. But
Degas was not to remain there, and already, about that time, certain
portraits of his are elevated by an expression of ardent melancholy, by
warm, ivory-like, grave colouring which attracts one’s eye. Before this
series one feels the firm will of a very logical, serious, classic spirit who
wants to know thoroughly the intimate resources of design, before
risking to choose from among them the elements which respond best to
his individual nature. If Degas was destined to invent, later on, so
personal a style of design that he could be accused of “drawing badly,”
this first period of his life is before us, to show the slow maturing of his
boldness and how carefully he first proved to himself his knowledge,
before venturing upon new things. In art the difficulty is, when one has
learnt everything, to forget, — that is, to appear to forget, so as to create
one’s own style, and this apparent forgetting cloaks an amalgamation of
science with mind. And Degas is one of those patient and reticent men
who spend years in arriving at this; he has much in common with
Hokusai, the old man “mad with painting,” who at the close of his
prodigious life invented arbitrary forms, after having given immortal
examples of his interpretation of the real.

DEGAS — THE LESSON IN THE FOYER

Degas is also clearly related to Corot, not only in the silvery
harmonies of his suave landscapes, but also, and particularly, in his
admirable faces whose inestimable power and moving sincerity we have
hardly commenced to understand. Degas passed slowly from classicism
to modernity. He never liked outbursts of colour; he is by no means an
Impressionist from this point of view. As a draughtsman of genius he
expresses all by the precision of the planes and values; a grey, a black
and some notes of colour suffice for him. This might establish a link
between him and Whistler, though he is much less mysterious and
diffuse. Whenever Degas plays with colour, it is with the same restraint
of his boldness; he never goes to excess in abandoning himself to its
charm. He is neither lyrical, nor voluptuous; his energy is cold; his wise
spirit affirms soberly the true character of a face or an object.
Since a long time this spirit has moved Degas to revel in the
observation of contemporary life. His nature has been that of a patient
psychologist, a minute analyst, and also of a bitter ironist. The man is
very little known. His friends say that he has an easily ruffled delicacy, a
sensibility open to poetry, but jealous of showing its emotion. They say
that Degas’s satirical bitterness is the reverse side of a soul wounded by
the spectacle of modern morality. One feels this sentiment in his work,
where the sharp notation of truth is painful, where the realism is opposed
by colouring of a sober distinction, where nothing, not even the portrait
of a drab, could be vulgar. Degas has devoted himself to the profound
study of certain classes of women, in the state of mind of a philosopher
and physiologist, impartially inclined towards life.
His work can be divided into several great series: the race-courses, the
ballet-dancers, and the women bathing count among the most important.
The race-courses have inspired Degas with numerous pictures. He shows
in them a surprising knowledge of the horse. He is one of the most
perfect painters of horses who have ever existed. He has caught the most
curious and truest actions with infallible sureness of sight. His
racecourse scenes are full of vitality and picturesqueness. Against clear
skies, and light backgrounds of lawn, indicated with quiet harmony,
Degas assembles original groups of horses which one can see moving,
hesitating, intensely alive; and nothing could be fresher, gayer and more
deliciously pictorial, than the green, red and yellow notes of the jockey’s
costumes strewn like flowers over these atmospheric, luminous
landscapes, where colours do not clash, but are always gently
shimmering, dissolved in uniform clearness. The admirable drawing of
horses and men is so precise and seems so simple, that one can only
slowly understand the extent of the difficulty overcome, the truth of
these attitudes and the nervous delicacy of the execution.

DEGAS — THE DANCING LESSON — PASTEL

 The dancers go much further still in the expression of Degas’s
temperament. They have been studied at the foyer of the Opera and at the
rehearsal, sometimes in groups, sometimes isolated. Some pictures
which will always count among the masterpieces of the nineteenth
century, represent the whole corps de ballet performing on the stage
before a dark and empty house. By the feeble light of some lamps the
black coats of the stage managers mix themselves with the gauze skirts.
Here the draughtsman joins the great colourist: the petticoats of pink or
white tulle, the graceful legs covered with flesh-coloured silk, the arms
and the shoulders, and the hair crowned with flowers, offer motives of
exquisite colour and of a tone of living flowers. But the psychologist
does not lose his rights: not only does he amuse himself with noting the
special movements of the dancers, but he also notes the anatomical
defects. He shows with cruel frankness, with a strange love of modern
character, the strong legs, the thin shoulders, and the provoking and
vulgar heads of these frequently ugly girls of common origin. With the
irony of an entomologist piercing the coloured insect he shows us the
disenchanting reality in the sad shadow of the scenes, of these butterflies
who dazzle us on the stage. He unveils the reverse side of a dream
without, however, caricaturing; he raises even, under the imperfection of
the bodies, the animal grace of the organisms; he has the severe beauty
of the true. He gives to his groups of ballet-dancers the charming line of
garlands and restores to them a harmony in the ensemble, so as to prove
that he does not misjudge the charm conferred upon them by rhythm,
however defective they may be individually. At other times he devotes
himself to the study of their practice. In bare rooms with curtainless
windows, in the cold and sad light of the boxes, he passionately draws
the dancers learning their steps, reaching high bars with the tips of their
toes, forcing themselves into quaint poses in order to make themselves
more supple, manoeuvring to the sound of a fiddle scratched by an old
teacher — and he leaves us stupefied at the knowledge, the observation,
the talent profusely spent on these little pictures. Furthermore there are
humorous scenes: ballet-dancers chatting in the dark with habitués of the
Opera, others looking at the house through the small opening of the
curtain, others re-tying their shoe-laces, and they all are prodigious
drawings of movement anatomically as correct as they are unexpected.
Degas’s old style of drawing undergoes modification: with the help of
slight deformations, accentuations of the modelling and subtle
falsifications of the proportions, managed with infinite tact and
knowledge, the artist brings forth in relief the important gesture,
subordinating to it all the others. He attempts drawing by movement as it
is caught by our eyes in life, where they do not state the proportions, but
first of all the gesture which strikes them. In these drawings by Degas all
the lines follow the impulsion of the thought. What one sees first, is the
movement transmitted to the members by the will. The active part of the
body is more carefully studied than the rest, which is indicated by bold
foreshortenings, placed in the second plane, and apparently only serves
to throw into relief the raised arm or leg. This is no longer merely exact,
it is true; it is a superior degree of truth.

DEGAS — THE DANCERS

These pictures of dancers are psychologic documents of great value.
The physical and moral atmosphere of these surroundings is called forth
by a master. Such and such a figure or attitude tells us more about
Parisian life than a whole novel, and Degas has been lavish of his
intellect and his philosophy of bitter scepticism. But they are also
marvellous pictorial studies which, in spite of the special, anecdotal
subjects, rise to the level of grand painting through sheer power of
draughtsmanship and charm of tone. Degas has the special quality of
giving the precise sensation of the third dimension. The atmosphere
circulates round his figures; you walk round them; you see them in their
real plane, and they present themselves in a thousand unexpected
arrangements. Degas is undoubtedly the one man of his age who has
most contributed towards infusing new life into the representation of
human figures: in this respect his pictures resemble no one else’s. The
same qualities will be found in his series of women bathing. These
interiors, where the actions of the bathers are caught amidst the stuffs,
flowered cushions, linen, sponges and tubs, are sharp visions of
modernity. Degas observes here, with the tenacious perfection of his
talent, the slightest shiver of the flesh refreshed by cold water. His
masterly drawing follows the most delicate inflexion of the muscles and
suggests the nervous system under the skin. He observes with
extraordinary subtlety the awkwardness of the nude being at a time when
nudity is no longer accustomed to show itself, and this true nudity is in
strong contrast to that of the academicians. One might say of Degas that
he has the disease of truth, if the necessity of truth were not health itself!
These bodies are still marked with the impressions of the garments; the
movements remain those of a clothed being which is only nude as an
exception. The painter notices beauty, but he looks for it particularly in
the profound characterisation of the types which he studies, and his
pastels have the massiveness and the sombre style of bronze. He has also
painted café-scenes, prostitutes and supers, with a mocking and sad
energy; he has even amused himself with painting washerwomen, to
translate the movements of the women of the people. And his colour
with its pearly whites, subdued blues and delicate greys, always elevates
everything he does, and confers upon him a distinctive style.
Finally, about 1896, Degas has revealed himself as a dreamy
landscapist. His recent landscapes are symphonies in colours of strange
harmony and hallucinations of rare tones, resembling music rather than
painting. It is perhaps in these pictures that he has revealed certain
dreams hitherto jealously hidden.
And now I must speak of his technique. It is very singular and varied,
and one of the most complicated in existence. In his first works, which
are apparently as simple as Corot’s, he does not employ the process of
colour-spots. But many of the works in his second manner are a
combination of drawing, painting and pastel. He has invented a kind of
engraving mixed with wash-drawing, pastel crayon crushed with brushes
of special pattern. Here one can find again his meticulous spirit. He has
many of the qualities of the scientist; he is as much chemist as painter. It
has been said of him, that he was a great artist of the decadence. This is
materially inexact, since his qualities of draughtsmanship are those of a
superb Classicist, and his colouring of very pure taste. But the spirit of
his work, his love of exact detail, his exaggerated psychological
refinement, are certainly the signs of an extremely alert intellect who
regards life prosaically and with a lassitude and disenchantment which
are only consoled by the passion for truth. Certain water-colours of his
heightened by pastel, and certain landscapes, are somewhat disconcerting
through the preciousness of his method; others are surprisingly
spontaneous. All his work has an undercurrent of thought. In short, this
Realist is almost a mystic. He has observed a limited section of
humanity, but what he has seen has not been seen so profoundly by
anybody else.

DEGAS — HORSES IN THE MEADOWS

Degas has exercised an occult, but very serious, influence. He has
lived alone, without pupils and almost without friends; the only pupils
one might speak of are the caricaturist Forain, who has painted many
small pictures inspired by him, and the excellent American lady-artist
Miss Mary Cassatt. But all modern draughtsmen have been taught a
lesson by his painting: Renouard, Toulouse-Lautrec and Steinlen have
been impressed by it, and the young generation considers Degas as a
master. And that is also the unexpressed idea of the academicians, and
especially of those who have sufficient talent to be able to appreciate all
the science and power of such an art. The writer of this book happened
one day to mention Degas’s name before a member of the Institute.
“What!” exclaimed he, “you know him? Why didn’t you speak to me
about him?” And when he received the reply, that I did not consider
Degas to be an agreeable topic for him, the illustrious official answered
vivaciously, “But do you think I am a fool, and that I do not know that
Degas is one of the greatest draughtsmen who have ever lived?” —
”Why, then, my dear sir, has he never been received at the Salons, and
not even been decorated at the age of sixty-five?” — ”Ah,” replied the
Academician a little angrily, “that is another matter!”
Degas despises glory. It is believed that he has by him a number of
canvases which will have to be burnt after his death in accordance with
his will. He is a man who has loved his art like a mistress, with jealous
passion, and has sacrificed to it all that other artists — enthusiasts even
— are accustomed to reserve for their personal interest. Degas, the
incomparable pastellist, the faultless draughtsman, the bitter, satirical,
pessimistic genius, is an isolated phenomenon in his period, a grand
creator, unattached to his time. The painters and the select few among
art-lovers know what considerable force there is in him. Though almost
latent as yet, it will reveal itself brilliantly, when an opportunity arises
for bringing together the vast quantity of his work. As is the case with
Manet, though in a different sense, his powerful classic qualities will
become most prominent in this ordeal, and this classicism has never
abandoned him in his audacities. To Degas is due a new method of
observation in drawing. He will have been the first to study the relation
between the moving lines of a living being and the immovable lines of
the scene which serves as its setting; the first, also, to define drawing, not
as a graphic science, but as the valuation of the third dimension, and thus
to apply to painting the principles hitherto reserved for sculpture. Finally,
he will be counted among the great analysts. His vision, tenacious,
intense, and sombre, stimulates thought: across what appears to be the
most immediate and even the most vulgar reality it reaches a grand,
artistic style; it states profoundly the facts of life, it condenses a little the
human soul: and this will suffice to secure for Degas an important place
in his epoch, a little apart from Impressionism. Without noise, and
through the sheer charm of his originality, he has contributed his share
towards undermining the false doctrines of academic art before the
painters, as Manet has undermined them before the public.
CLAUDE MONET — AN INTERIOR, AFTER DINNER
 V CLAUDE MONET: HIS WORK, HIS
INFLUENCE

With Claude Monet we enter upon Impressionism in its most

significant technical expression, and touch upon the principal points
referred to in the second chapter of this book.
Claude Monet, the artistic descendant of Claude Lorrain, Turner, and
Monticelli, has had the merit and the originality of opening a new road to
landscape painting by deducing scientific statements from the study of
the laws of light. His work is a magnificent verification of the optical
discoveries made by Helmholtz and Chevreul. It is born spontaneously
from the artist’s vision, and happens to be a rigorous demonstration of
principles which the painter has probably never cared to know. Through
the power of his faculties the artist has happened to join hands with the
scientist. His work supplies not only the very basis of the Impressionist
movement proper, but of all that has followed it and will follow it in the
study of the so-called chromatic laws. It will serve to give, so to say, a
mathematic necessity to the happy finds met by the artists hitherto, and it
will also serve to endow decorative art and mural painting with a
process, the applications of which are manyfold and splendid.
I have already summed up the ideas which follow from Claude
Monet’s painting more clearly even than from Manet’s. Suppression of
local colour, study of reflections by means of complementary colours
and division of tones by the process of touches of pure, juxtaposed
colours — these are the essential principles of chromatism (for this word
should be used instead of the very vague term “Impressionism”). Claude
Monet has applied them systematically, especially in landscape painting.
There are a few portraits of his, which show that he might have made
an excellent figure painter, if landscape had not absorbed him entirely.
One of these portraits, a large full-length of a lady with a fur-lined jacket
and a satin dress with green and black stripes, would in itself be
sufficient to save from oblivion the man who has painted it. But the
study of light upon the figure has been the special preoccupation of
Manet, Renoir, and Pissarro, and, after the Impressionists, of the great
lyricist, Albert Besnard, who has concentrated the Impressionist qualities
by placing them at the service of a very personal conception of
symbolistic art. Monet commenced with trying to find his way by
painting figures, then landscapes and principally sea pictures and boats
in harbours, with a somewhat sombre robustness and very broad and
solid draughtsmanship. His first luminous studies date back to about
1885. Obedient to the same ideas as Degas he had to avoid the Salons
and only show his pictures gradually in private galleries. For years he
remained unknown. It is only giving M. Durand-Ruel his due, to state
that he was one of the first to anticipate the Impressionist school and to
buy the first works of these painters, who were treated as madmen and
charlatans. He has become great with them, and has made his fortune and
theirs through having had confidence in them, and no fortune has been
better deserved. Thirty years ago nobody would have bought pictures by
Degas or Monet, which are sold to-day for a thousand pounds. This
detail is only mentioned to show the evolution of Impressionism as
regards public opinion.

CLAUDE MONET — THE HARBOUR, HONFLEUR

So much has Monet been attracted by the analysis of the laws of light
that he has made light the real subject of all his pictures, and to show
clearly his intention he has treated one and the same site in a series of
pictures painted from nature at all hours of the day. This is the principle
whose results are the great divisions of his work which might be called
“Investigation of the variations of sunlight.” The most famous of these
series are the Hay-ricks, the Poplars, the Cliffs of Etretat, the Golfe Juan,
the Coins de Rivière, the Cathedrals, the Water-lilies, and finally the
Thames series which Monet is at present engaged upon. They are like
great poems, and the splendour of the chosen theme, the orchestration of
the shivers of brightness, the symphonic parti-pris of the colours, make
their realism, the minute contemplation of reality, approach idealism and
lyric dreaming.
Monet paints these series from nature. He is said to take with him in a
carriage at sunrise some twenty canvases which he changes from hour to
hour, taking them up again the next day. He notes, for example, from
nine to ten o’clock the most subtle effects of sunlight upon a hay-rick; at
ten o’clock he passes on to another canvas and recommences the study
until eleven o’clock. Thus he follows step by step the modifications of
the atmosphere until nightfall, and finishes simultaneously the works of
the whole series. He has painted a hay-stack in a field twenty times over,
and the twenty hay-stacks are all different. He exhibits them together,
and one can follow, led by the magic of his brush, the history of light
playing upon one and the same object. It is a dazzling display of
luminous atoms, a kind of pantheistic evocation. Light is certainly the
essential personage who devours the outlines of the objects, and is
thrown like a translucent veil between our eyes and matter. One can see
the vibrations of the waves of the solar spectrum, drawn by the
arabesque of the spots of the seven prismatic hues juxtaposed with
infinite subtlety; and this vibration is that of heat, of atmospheric vitality.
The silhouettes melt into the sky; the shadows are lights where certain
tones, the blue, the purple, the green and the orange, predominate, and it
is the proportional quantity of the spots that differentiates in our eyes the
shadows from what we call the lights, just as it actually happens in optic
science. There are some midday scenes by Claude Monet, where every
material silhouette — tree, hay-rick, or rock — is annihilated, volatilised
in the fiery vibration of the dust of sunlight, and before which the
beholder gets really blinded, just as he would in actual sunlight.
Sometimes even there are no more shadows at all, nothing that could
serve to indicate the values and to create contrasts of colours. Everything
is light, and the painter seems easily to overcome those terrible
difficulties, lights upon lights, thanks to a gift of marvellous subtlety of
sight.
 CLAUDE MONET — THE CHURCH AT VARENGEVILLE
Generally he finds a very simple motif sufficient; a hay-rick, some
slender trunks rising skywards, or a cluster of shrubs. But he also proves
himself as powerful draughtsman when he attacks themes of greater
complexity. Nobody knows as he does how to place a rock amidst
tumultuous waves, how to make one understand the enormous
construction of a cliff which fills the whole canvas, how to give the
sensation of a cluster of pines bent by the wind, how to throw a bridge
across a river, or how to express the massiveness of the soil under a
summer sun. All this is constructed with breadth, truth and force under
the delicious or fiery symphony of the luminous atoms. The most
unexpected tones play in the foliage. On close inspection we are
astonished to find it striped with orange, red, blue and yellow touches,
but seen at a certain distance the freshness of the green foliage appears to
be represented with infallible truth. The eye recomposes what the brush
has dissociated, and one finds oneself perplexed at all the science, all the
secret order which has presided over this accumulation of spots which
seem projected in a furious shower. It is a veritable orchestral piece,
where every colour is an instrument with a distinct part, and where the
hours with their different tints represent the successive themes. Monet is
the equal of the greatest landscape painters as regards the comprehension
of the true character of every soil he has studied, which is the supreme
quality of his art. Though absorbed beyond all by study of the sunlight,
he has thought it useless to go to Morocco or Algeria. He has found
Brittany, Holland, the Ile de France, the Cote d’Azur and England
sufficient sources of inspiration for his symphonies, which cover from
end to end the scale of perceptible colours. He has expressed, for
instance, the mild and vaporous softness of the Mediterranean, the
luxuriant vegetation of the gardens of Cannes and Antibes, with a
truthfulness and knowledge of the psychology of land and water which
can only be properly appreciated by those who live in this enchanted
region. This has not prevented him from understanding better than
anybody the wildness, the grand austereness of the rocks of Belle-Isle en
mer, to express it in pictures in which one really feels the wind, the
spray, and the roaring of the heavy waters breaking against the
impassibility of the granite rocks. His recent series of Water-lilies
expressed all the melancholic and fresh charm of quiet basins, of sweet
bits of water blocked by rushes and calyxes. He has painted underwoods
in the autumn, where the most subtle shades of bronze and gold are at
play, chrysanthemums, pheasants, roofs at twilight, dazzling sunflowers,
gardens, tulip-fields in Holland, bouquets, effects of snow and hoar frost
of exquisite softness, and sailing boats passing in the sun. He has painted
some views of the banks of the Seine which are quite wonderful in their
power of conjuring up these scenes, and over all this has roved his
splendid vision of a great, amorous and radiant colourist. The Cathedrals
are even more of a tour de force of his talent. They consist of seventeen
studies of Rouen Cathedral, the towers of which fill the whole of the
picture, leaving barely a little space, a little corner of the square, at the
foot of the enormous stone-shafts which mount to the very top of the
picture. Here he has no proper means to express the play of the
reflections, no changeful waters or foliage: the grey stone, worn by time
and blackened by centuries, is for seventeen times the monochrome, the
thankless theme upon which the painter is about to exercise his vision.
But Monet finds means of making the most dazzling atmospheric
harmonies sparkle upon this stone. Pale and rosy at sunrise, purple at
midday, glowing in the evening under the rays of the setting sun,
standing out from the crimson and gold, scarcely visible in the mist, the
colossal edifice impresses itself upon the eye, reconstructed with its
thousand details of architectural chiselling, drawn without minuteness
but with superb decision, and these pictures approach the composite,
bold and rich tone of Oriental carpets.
 CLAUDE MONET — POPLARS ON THE EPTE IN AUTUMN
Monet excels also in suggesting the drawing of light, if I may venture
to use this expression. He makes us understand the movement of the
vibrations of heat, the movement of the luminous waves; he also
understands how to paint the sensation of strong wind. “Before one of
Manet’s pictures,” said Mme. Morisot, “I always know which way to
incline my umbrella.” Monet is also an incomparable painter of water.
Pond, river, or sea — he knows how to differentiate their colouring, their
consistency, and their currents, and he transfixes a moment of their
fleeting life. He is intuitive to an exceptional degree in the intimate
composition of matter, water, earth, stone or air, and this intuition serves
him in place of intellectuality in his art. He is a painter par excellence, a
man born for painting, and this power of penetrating the secrets of matter
and of light helps him to attain a kind of grand, unconsciously lyrical
poetry. He transposes the immediate truth of our vision and elevates it to
decorative grandeur. If Manet is the realist-romanticist of Impressionism,
if Degas is its psychologist, Claude Monet is its lyrical pantheist.
His work is immense. He produces with astonishing rapidity, and he
has yet another characteristic of the great painters: that of having put his
hand to every kind of subject. His recent studies of the Thames are, at the
decline of his energetic maturity, as beautiful and as spontaneous as the
Hay-ricks of seventeen years back. They are thrillingly truthful visions
of fairy mists, where showers of silver and gold sparkle through rosy
vapours; and at the same time Monet combines in this series the dream-
landscapes of Turner with Monticelli’s accumulation of precious stones.
Thus interpreted by this intense faculty of synthesis, nature, simplified in
detail and contemplated in its grand lines, becomes truly a living dream.
Since the Hay-ricks one can say that the work of Claude Monet is
glorious. It has been made sacred to the admiring love of the
connoisseurs on the day when Monet joined Rodin in an exhibition
which is famous in the annals of modern art. Yet no official distinction
has intervened to recognise one of the greatest painters of the nineteenth
century. The influence of Monet has been enormous all over Europe and
America. The process of colour spots2 (let us adhere to this rudimentary
name which has become current) has been adopted by a whole crowd of
painters. I shall have to say a few words about it at the end of this book.
But it is befitting to terminate this all too short study by explaining that
the most lyrical of the Impressionists has also been the theorist par
excellence. His work connects easel painting with mural painting. No
Minister of Fine Arts has been found, who would surmount the
systematic opposition of the official painters, and give Manet a
commission for grand mural compositions, for which his method is
admirably suited. It has taken long years before such works were
entrusted to Besnard, who, with Puvis de Chavannes, has given Paris her
most beautiful modern decorations, but Besnard’s work is the direct
outcome of Claude Monet’s harmonies. The principle of the division of
tones and of the study of complementary colours has been full of
revelations, and one of the most fruitful theories. It has probably been the
principle which will designate most clearly the originality of the painting
of the future. To have invented it, is enough to secure permanent glory
for a man. And without wishing to put again the question of the
antagonism of realism and idealism, one may well say that a painter who
invents a method and shows such power, is highly intellectual and gifted
with a pictorial intelligence. Whatever the subjects he treats, he creates
an aesthetic emotion equivalent, if not similar, to those engendered by
the most complex symbolism. In his ardent love of nature Monet has
found his greatness; he suggests the secrets by stating the evident facts.
That is the law common to all the arts.
CLAUDE MONET — THE BRIDGE AT ARGENTEUIL
 VI AUGUSTE RENOIR AND HIS WORK

The work of Auguste Renoir extends without interruption over a period

of forty years. It appears to sum up the ideas and methods of
Impressionist art so completely that, should it alone be saved from a
general destruction, it would suffice to bear witness to this entire art
movement. It has unfolded itself from 1865 to our days with a happy
magnificence, and it allows us to distinguish several periods, in the
technique at least, since the variety of its subjects is infinite. Like Manet,
and like all truly great and powerful painters, M. Renoir has treated
almost everything, nudes, portraits, subject pictures, seascapes and still-
life, all with equal beauty.
His first manner shows him to be a very direct descendant of Boucher.
His female nudes are altogether in eighteenth century taste and he uses
the same technique as Boucher: fat and sleek paint of soft brilliancy, laid
on with the palette knife, with precise strokes round the principal values;
pink and ivory tints relieved by strong blues similar to those of enamels;
the light distributed everywhere and almost excluding the opposition of
the shadows; and, finally, vivacious attitudes and an effort towards
decorative convention. Nevertheless, his Bathers, of which he has
painted a large series, are in many ways thoroughly modern and
personal. Renoir’s nude is neither that of Monet, nor of Degas, whose
main concern was truth, the last-named even trying to define in the
undressed being such psychologic observations as are generally looked
for in the features of the clothed being. Nor is Renoir’s nude that of the
academicians, that poetised nude arranged according to a pseudo-Greek
ideal, which has nothing in common with contemporary women. What
Renoir sees in the nude is less the line, than the brilliancy of the
epidermis, the luminous, nacreous substance of the flesh: it is the “ideal
clay”; and in this he shows the vision of a poet; he transfigures reality,
but in a very different sense from that of the School. Renoir’s woman
comes from a primitive dream-land; she is an artless, wild creature,
blooming in perfumed scrub. He sets her in backgrounds of foliage or of
blue, foam-fringed torrents. She is a luxuriant, firm, healthy and naïve
woman with a powerful body, a small head, her eyes wide open,
thoughtless, brilliant and ignorant, her lips blood-red and her nostrils
dilated; she is a gentle being, like the women of Tahiti, born in a tropical
clime where vice is as unknown as shame, and where entire
ingenuousness is a guarantee against all indecency. One cannot but be
astonished at this mixture of “Japanism,” savagism and eighteenth
century taste, which constitutes inimitably the nude of Renoir.

RENOIR — DÉJEUNER
 RENOIR — IN THE BOX
M. Renoir’s second manner is more directly related to the
Impressionist methods: it is that of his landscapes, his flowers and his
portraits. Here one can feel his relationship with Manet and with Claude
Monet. These pictures are hatchings of colours accumulated to render
less the objects than their transparency across the atmosphere. The
portraits are frankly presented and broadly executed. The artist occupies
himself in the first place with getting correct values and an exact
suggestion of depth. He understands the illogicality of a false perfection
which is as interested in a trinket as in an eye, and he knows how to
proportion the interest of the picture which should guide the beholder’s
look to the essential point, though every part should be correctly
executed. He knows how to interpret nature in a certain sense; how to
stop in time; how to suggest by leaving a part apparently unfinished; how
to indicate, behind a figure, the sea or some landscape with just a few
broad touches which suffice to suggest it without usurping the principal
part. It is now, that Renoir paints his greatest works, the Déjeûner des
Canotiers, the Bal au Moulin de la Galette, the Box, the Terrace, the
First Step, the Sleeping Woman with a Cat, and his most beautiful
landscapes; but his nature is too capricious to be satisfied with a single
technique. There are some landscapes that are reminiscent of Corot or of
Anton Mauve; the Woman with the broken neck is related to Manet; the
portrait of Sisley invents pointillism fifteen years before the pointillists;
La Pensée, this masterpiece, evokes Hoppner. But in everything
reappears the invincible French instinct: the Jeune Fille au panier is a
Greuze painted by an Impressionist; the delightful Jeune Fille à la
promenade is connected with Fragonard; the Box, a perfect marvel of
elegance and knowledge, condenses the whole worldliness of 1875. The
portrait of Jeanne Samary is an evocation of the most beautiful portraits
of the eighteenth century, a poem of white satin and golden hair.

RENOIR — YOUNG GIRL PROMENADING

Renoir’s realism bears in spite of all, the imprint of the lyric spirit and
of sweetness. It has neither the nervous veracity of Manet, nor the
bitterness of Degas, who both love their epoch and find it interesting
without idealising it and who have the vision of psychologist novelists.
Before everything else he is a painter. What he sees in the Bal au Moulin
de la Galette, are not the stigmata of vice and impudence, the ridiculous
and the sad sides of the doubtful types of this low resort. He sees the
gaiety of Sundays, the flashes of the sun, the oddity of a crowd carried
away by the rhythm of the valses, the laughter, the clinking of glasses,
the vibrating and hot atmosphere; and he applies to this spectacle of
joyous vulgarity his gifts as a sumptuous colourist, the arabesque of the
lines, the gracefulness of his bathers, and the happy eurythmy of his soul.
The straw hats are changed into gold, the blue jackets are sapphires, and
out of a still exact realism is born a poem of light. The Déjeûner des
Canotiers is a subject which has been painted a hundred times, either for
the purpose of studying popular types, or of painting white table-cloths
amidst sunny foliage. Yet Renoir is the only painter who has raised this
small subject to the proportions and the style of a large canvas, through
the pictorial charm and the masterly richness of the arrangement. The
Box, conceived in a low harmony, in a golden twilight, is a work worthy
of Reynolds. The pale and attentive face of the lady makes one think of
the great English master’s best works; the necklace, the flesh, the flounce
of lace and the hands are marvels of skill and of taste, which the greatest
modern virtuosos, Sargent and Besnard, have not surpassed, and, as far
as the man in the background is concerned, his white waistcoat, his
dress-coat, his gloved hand would suffice to secure the fame of a painter.
The Sleeping Woman, the First Step, the Terrace, and the decorative
Dance panels reveal Renoir as an intimiste and as an admirable painter of
children. His strange colouring and his gifts of grasping nature and of
ingenuity — strangers to all decadent complexity — have allowed him to
rank among the best of those who have expressed childhood in its true
aspect, without overloading it with over-precocious thoughts. Finally,
Renoir is a painter of flowers of dazzling variety and exquisite splendour.
They supply him with inexhaustible pretexts for suave and subtle
harmonies.
 RENOIR — WOMAN’S BUST
His third manner has surprised and deceived certain admirers of his. It
seems to mix his two first techniques, combining the painting with the
palette knife and the painting in touches of divided tones. He searches
for certain accords and contrasts almost analogous to the musical
dissonances. He realises incredible “false impressions.” He seems to take
as themes oriental carpets: he abandons realism and style and conceives
symphonies. He pleases himself in assembling those tones which one is
generally afraid of using: Turkish pink, lemon, crushed strawberry and
viridian. Sometimes he amuses himself with amassing faded colours
which would be disheartening with others, but out of which he can
extract a harmony. Sometimes he plays with the crudest colours. One
feels disturbed, charmed, disconcerted, as one would before an Indian
shawl, a barbaric piece of pottery or a Persian miniature, and one refrains
from forcing into the limits of a definition this exceptional virtuoso
whose passionate love of colour overcomes every difficulty. It is in this
most recent part of his evolution, that Renoir appears the most capricious
and the most poetical of all the painters of his generation. The flowers
find themselves treated in various techniques according to their own
character: the gladioles and roses in pasty paint, the poor flowers of the
field are defined by a cross-hatching of little touches. Influenced by the
purple shadow of the large flower-decked hats, the heads of young girls
are painted on coarse canvas, sketched in broad strokes, with the hair in
one colour only. Some little study appears like wool, some other has the
air of agate, or is marbled and veined according to his inexplicable
whim. We have here an incessant confusion of methods, a complete
emancipation of the virtuoso who listens only to his fancy. Now and then
the harmonies are false and the drawing incorrect, but these weaknesses
do at least no harm to the values, the character and the general movement
of the work, which are rather accentuated by them.

RENOIR — YOUNG WOMAN IN EMPIRE COSTUME

Surely, it would be false to exclude ideologist painting which has
produced wonders, and not less iniquitous to reproach Impressionism
with not having taken any interest in it! One has to avoid the kind of
criticism which consists in reproaching one movement with not having
had the qualities of the others whilst maintaining its own, and we have
abandoned the idea of Beauty divided into a certain number of clauses
and programmes, towards the sum total of which the efforts of the
eclectic candidates are directed. M. Renoir is probably the most
representative figure of a movement where he seems to have united all
the qualities of his friends. To criticise him means to criticise
Impressionism itself. Having spent half of its strength in proving to its
adversaries that they were wrong, and the other half in inventing
technical methods, it is not surprising to find that Impressionism has
been wanting in intellectual depth and has left to its successors the care
of realising works of great thought. But it has brought us a sunny smile, a
breath of pure air. It is so fascinating, that one cannot but love its very
mistakes which make it more human and more accessible. Renoir is the
most lyrical, the most musical, the most subtle of the masters of this art.
Some of his landscapes are as beautiful as those of Claude Monet. His
nudes are as masterly in painting as Manet’s, and more supple. Not
having attained the scientific drawing which one finds in Degas’s, they
have a grace and a brilliancy which Degas’s nudes have never known. If
his rare portraits of men are inferior to those of his rivals, his women’s
portraits have a frequently superior distinction. His great modern
compositions are equal to the most beautiful works by Manet and Degas.
His inequalities are also more striking than theirs. Being a fantastic,
nervous improvisator he is more exposed to radical mistakes. But he is a
profoundly sincere and conscientious artist.
 RENOIR — ON THE TERRACE
The race speaks in him. It is inexplicable that he should not have met
with startling success, since he is voluptuous, bright, happy and learned
without heaviness. One has to attribute his relative isolation to the
violence of the controversies, and particularly to the dignity of a poet
gently disdainful of public opinion and paying attention solely to
painting, his great and only love. Manet has been a fighter whose works
have created scandal. Renoir has neither shown, nor hidden himself: he
has painted according to his dream, spreading his works, without mixing
up his name or his personality with the tumult that raged around his
friends. And now, for that very reason, his work appears fresher and
younger, more primitive and candid, more intoxicated with flowers, flesh
and sunlight.
 VII THE SECONDARY PAINTERS OF
IMPRESSIONISM

CAMILLE PISSARRO, ALFRED SISLEY, PAUL CÉZANNE, BERTHE MORISOT, MISS

MARY CASSATT, EVA GONZALÈS, GUSTAVE CAILLEBOTTE, BAZILLE, ALBERT
LEBOURG, EUGÈNE BOUDIN
.
Manet, Degas, Monet and Renoir will present themselves as a glorious
quartet of masters, in the history of painting. We must now speak of
some personalities who have grown up by their side and who, without
being great, offer nevertheless a rich and beautiful series of works.
Of these personalities the most considerable is certainly that of M.
Camille Pissarro. He painted according to some wise and somewhat
timid formulas, when Manet’s example won him over to Impressionism
to which he has remained faithful. M. Pissarro has been enormously
productive. His work is composed of landscapes, rustic scenes, and
studies of streets and markets. His first landscapes are in the manner of
Corot, but bathed in blond colour: vast cornfields, sunny woods, skies
with big, flocking clouds, effects of soft light — these are the motifs of
some charming canvases which have a solid, classic quality. Later the
artist adopted the method of the dissociation of tones, from which he
obtained some happy effects. His harvest and market scenes are
luminous and alive. The figures in these recall those of Millet. They bear
witness to high qualities of sincere observation, and are the work of a
man profoundly enamoured of rustic life. M. Pissarro excels in grouping
the figures, in correctly catching their attitudes and in rendering the
medley of a crowd in the sun. Certain fans in particular will always
remain delightful caprices of fresh colour, but it would be vain to look in
this attractive, animated and clear painting for the psychologic gifts, the
profound feeling for grand silhouettes, and the intuition of the worn and
gloomy soul of the men of the soil, which have made Millet’s noble
glory. At the time when, about 1885, the neo-Impressionists whom we
shall study later on invented the Pointillist method, M. Pissarro tried it
and applied it judiciously, with the patient, serious and slightly anxious
talent, by which he is distinguished. Recently, in a series of pictures
representing views of Paris (the boulevards and the Avenue de l’Opéra)
M. Pissarro has shewn rare vision and skill and has perhaps signed his
most beautiful and personal paintings. The perspective, the lighting, the
tones of the houses and of the crowds, the reflections of rain or sunshine
are intensely true; they make one feel the atmosphere, the charm and the
soul of Paris. One can say of Pissarro that he lacks none of the gifts of
his profession. He is a learned, fruitful and upright artist. But he has
lacked originality; he always recalls those whom he admires and whose
ideas he applies boldly and tastefully. It is probable that his conscientious
nature has contributed not little towards keeping him in the second rank.
Incapable, certainly, of voluntarily imitating, this excellent and diligent
painter has not had the sparks of genius of his friends, but all that can be
given to a man through conscientious study, striving after truth and love
of art, has been acquired by M. Pissarro. The rest depended on destiny
only. There is no character more worthy of respect and no effort more
meritorious than his, and there can be no better proof of his
disinterestedness and his modesty, than the fact that, although he has
thirty years of work behind him, an honoured name and white hair, M.
Pissarro did not hesitate to adopt, quite frankly, the technique of the
young Pointillist painters, his juniors, because it appeared to him better
than his own. He is, if not a great painter, at least one of the most
interesting rustic landscape painters of our epoch. His visions of the
country are quite his own, and are a harmonious mixture of Classicism
and Impressionism which will secure one of the most honourable places
to his work.
PISSARRO — RUE DE L’EPICERIE, ROUEN

PISSARRO — BOULEVARDE MONTMARTRE

 PISSARRO — THE BOILDIEAUX BRIDGE AT ROUEN

PISSARRO — THE AVENUE DE L’OPÉRA

There has, perhaps, been more original individuality in the landscape
painter Alfred Sisley. He possessed in the highest degree the feeling for
light, and if he did not have the power, the masterly passion of Claude
Monet, he will at least deserve to be frequently placed by his side as
regards the expression of certain combinations of light. He did not have
the decorative feeling which makes Monet’s landscapes so imposing; one
does not see in his work that surprising lyrical interpretation which
knows how to express the drama of the raging waves, the heavy slumber
of enormous masses of rock, the intense torpor of the sun on the sea. But
in all that concerns the mild aspects of the Ile de France, the sweet and
fresh landscapes, Sisley is not unworthy of being compared with Monet.
He equals him in numerous pictures; he has a similar delicacy of
perception, a similar fervour of execution. He is the painter of great, blue
rivers curving towards the horizon; of blossoming orchards; of bright
hills with red-roofed hamlets scattered about; he is, beyond all, the
painter of French skies which he presents with admirable vivacity and
facility. He has the feeling for the transparency of atmosphere, and if his
technique allies him directly with Impressionism, one can well feel, that
he painted spontaneously and that this technique happened to be adapted
to his nature, without his having attempted to appropriate it for the sake
of novelty. Sisley has painted a notable series of pictures in the quaint
village of Moret on the outskirts of the Forest of Fontainebleau, where he
died at a ripe age, and these canvases will figure among the most
charming landscapes of our epoch. Sisley was a veteran of
Impressionism. At the Exhibition of 1900, in the two rooms reserved for
the works of this school, there were to be seen a dozen of Sisley’s
canvases. By the side of the finest Renoirs, Monets and Manets they kept
their charm and their brilliancy with a singular flavour, and this was for
many critics a revelation as to the real place of this artist, whom they had
hitherto considered as a pretty colourist of only relative importance.

SISLEY — SNOW EFFECT

 SISLEY — BOUGIVAL, AT THE WATER’S EDGE

SISLEY — BRIDGE AT MORET

Paul Cézanne, unknown to the public, is appreciated by a small group
of art lovers. He is an artist who lives in Provence, away from the world;
he is supposed to have served as model for the Impressionist painter
Claude Lantier, described by Zola in his celebrated novel “L’Oeuvre.”
Cézanne has painted landscapes, rustic scenes and still-life pictures. His
figures are clumsy and brutal and inharmonious in colour, but his
landscapes have the merit of a robust simplicity of vision. These pictures
are almost primitive, and they are loved by the young Impressionists
because of their exclusion of all “cleverness.” A charm of rude simplicity
and sincerity can be found in these works in which Cézanne employs
only just the means which are indispensable for his end. His still-life
pictures are particularly interesting owing to the spotless brilliancy of
their colours, the straightforwardness of the tones, and the originality of
certain shades analogous to those of old faience. Cézanne is a
conscientious painter without skill, intensely absorbed in rendering what
he sees, and his strong and tenacious attention has sometimes succeeded
in finding beauty. He reminds more of an ancient Gothic craftsman, than
of a modern artist, and he is full of repose as a contrast to the dazzling
virtuosity of so many painters.

CÉZANNE — DESSERT
Berthe Morisot will remain the most fascinating figure of
Impressionism, — the one who has stated most precisely the femineity of
this luminous and iridescent art. Having married Eugène Manet, the
brother of the great painter, she exhibited at various private galleries,
where the works of the first Impressionists were to be seen, and became
as famous for her talent as for her beauty. When Manet died, she took
charge of his memory and of his work, and she helped with all her
energetic intelligence to procure them their just and final estimation.
Mme. Eugène Manet has certainly been one of the most beautiful types
of French women of the end of the nineteenth century. When she died
prematurely at the age of fifty (in 1895), she left a considerable amount
of work: gardens, young girls, water-colours of refined taste, of
surprising energy, and of a colouring as distinguished, as it is
unexpected. As great grand-daughter of Fragonard, Berthe Morisot
(since we ought to leave her the name with which her respect for Manet’s
great name made her always sign her works) seemed to have inherited
from her famous ancestor his French gracefulness, his spirited elegance,
and all his other great qualities. She has also felt the influence of Corot,
of Manet and of Renoir. All her work is bathed in brightness, in azure, in
sunlight; it is a woman’s work, but it has a strength, a freedom of touch
and an originality, which one would hardly have expected. Her water-
colours, particularly, belong to a superior art: some notes of colour
suffice to indicate sky, sea, or a forest background, and everything shows
a sure and masterly fancy, for which our time can offer no analogy. A
series of Berthe Morisot’s works looks like a veritable bouquet whose
brilliancy is due less to the colour-schemes which are comparatively soft,
grey and blue, than to the absolute correctness of the values. A hundred
canvases, and perhaps three hundred water-colours attest this talent of
the first rank. Normandy coast scenes with pearly skies and turquoise
horizons, sparkling Nice gardens, fruit-laden orchards, girls in white
dresses with big flower-decked hats, young women in ball-dress, and
flowers are the favourite themes of this artist who was the friend of
Renoir, of Degas and of Mallarmé.

BERTHE MORISOT — MELANCHOLY

 BERTHE MORISOT — YOUNG WOMAN SEATED
Miss Mary Cassatt will deserve a place by her side. American by birth,
she became French through her assiduous participation in the exhibitions
of the Impressionists. She is one of the very few painters whom Degas
has advised, with Forain and M. Ernest Rouart. (This latter, a painter
himself, a son of the painter and wealthy collector Henri Rouart, has
married Mme. Manet’s daughter who is also an artist.) Miss Cassatt has
made a speciality of studying children, and she is, perhaps, the artist of
this period who has understood and expressed them with the greatest
originality. She is a pastellist of note, and some of her pastels are as good
as Manet’s and Degas’s, so far as broad execution and brilliancy and
delicacy of tones are concerned. Ten years ago Miss Cassatt exhibited a
series of ten etchings in colour, representing scenes of mothers and
children at their toilet. At that time this genre was almost abandoned, and
Miss Cassatt caused astonishment by her boldness which faced the most
serious difficulties. One can relish in this artist’s pictures, besides the
great qualities of solid draughtsmanship, correct values, and skilful
interpretation of flesh and stuffs, a profound sentiment of infantile life,
childish gestures, clear and unconscious looks, and the loving expression
of the mothers. Miss Cassatt is the painter and psychologist of babies and
young mothers whom she likes to depict in the freshness of an orchard,
or against backgrounds of the flowered hangings of dressing-rooms,
amidst bright linen, tubs, and china, in smiling intimacy. To these two
remarkable women another has to be added, Eva Gonzalès, the favourite
pupil of Manet who has painted a fine portrait of her. Eva Gonzalès
became the wife of the excellent engraver Henri Guérard, and died
prematurely, not, however, before one was able to admire her talent as an
exquisitely delicate pastellist. Having first been a pupil of Chaplin, she
soon came to forget the tricks of technique in order to acquire under
Manet’s guidance the qualities of clearness and the strength of the great
painter of Argenteuil; and she would certainly have taken one of the first
places in modern art, had not her career been cut short by death. A small
pastel at the Luxembourg Gallery proves her convincing qualities as a
colourist.

MARY CASSATT — GETTING UP BABY

MARY CASSATT — WOMEN AND CHILD

 Gustave Caillebotte was a friend of the Impressionists from the very
first hour. He was rich, fond of art, and himself a painter of great merit
who modestly kept hidden behind his comrades. His picture Les
raboteurs de parquets made him formerly the butt of derision. To-day his
work, at the Luxembourg Gallery seems hardly a fit pretext for so much
controversy, but at that time much was considered as madness, that to
our eyes appears quite natural. This picture is a study of oblique
perspective and its curious ensemble of rising lines sufficed to provoke
astonishment. The work is, moreover, grey and discreet in colour and has
some qualities of fine light, but is on the whole not very interesting.
Recently an exhibition of works by Caillebotte has made it apparent that
this amateur was a misjudged painter. The still-life pictures in this
exhibition were specially remarkable. But the name of Caillebotte was
destined to reach the public only in connection with controversies and
scandal. When he died, he left to the State a magnificent collection of
objets-d’art and of old pictures, and also a collection of Impressionist
works, stipulating that these two bequests should be inseparable. He
wished by this means to impose the works of his friends upon the
museums, and thus avenge their unjust neglect. The State accepted the
two legacies, since the Louvre absolutely wanted to benefit by the
ancient portion, in spite of the efforts of the Academicians who revolted
against the acceptance of the modern part. On this occasion one could
see how far the official artists were carried by their hatred of the
Impressionists. A group of Academicians, professors at the Ecole des
Beaux-Arts, threatened the minister that they would resign en masse.
“We cannot,” they wrote to the papers, “continue to teach an art of which
we believe we know the laws, from the moment the State admits into the
museums, where our pupils can see them, works which are the very
negation of all we teach.” A heated discussion followed in the press, and
the minister boldly declared that Impressionism, good or bad, had
attracted the attention of the public, and that it was the duty of the State
to receive impartially the work of all the art movements; the public
would know how to judge and choose; the Government’s duty was not to
influence them by showing them only one style of painting, but to
remain in historic neutrality. Thanks to this clever reply, the
Academicians, among whom M. Gérôme was the most rabid, resigned
themselves to keeping their posts. A similar incident, less publicly
violent, but equally strange, occurred on the occasion of the admission to
the Luxembourg Gallery of the portrait of M. Whistler’s mother, a
masterpiece of which the gallery is proud to-day, and for which a group
of writers and art lovers had succeeded in opening the way. It is difficult
to imagine the degree of irritation and obstruction of the official painters
against all the ideas of the new painting, and if it had only depended
upon them, there can be no doubt that Manet and his friends would have
died in total obscurity, not only banished from the Salons and museums,
but also treated as madmen and robbed of the possibility of living by
their work.
The Caillebotte collection was installed under conditions which the ill-
will of the administrators made at least as deplorable as possible. The
works were crowded into a small, badly lighted room, where it is
absolutely impossible to see them from the distance required by the
method of the division of tones, and the meanness of the opposition was
such that, the pictures having been bequeathed without frames, the
keeper was obliged to have recourse to the reserves of the Louvre,
because he was refused the necessary credit for purchasing them. The
collection is however beautiful and interesting. It does not represent
Impressionism in all its brilliancy, since the works by which it is
composed had been bought by Caillebotte at a time, when his friends
were still far from having arrived at the full blossoming of their qualities.
But some very fine things can at least be found there. Renoir is
marvellously represented by the Moulin de la Galette, which is one of
his masterpieces. Degas figures with seven beautiful pastels, Monet with
some landscapes grand in style; Sisley and Pissarro appear scarcely to
their advantage, and finally it is to be regretted, that Manet is only
represented by a study in black in his first manner, the Balcony, which
does not count among his best pictures, and the famous Olympia whose
importance is more historical than intrinsic. The gallery has separately
acquired a Young Girl in Ball Dress by Berthe Morisot, which is a
delicate marvel of grace and freshness. And in the place of honour of the
gallery is to be seen Fantin-Latour’s great picture Hommage à Manet, in
which the painter, seated before his easel, is surrounded by his friends;
and this canvas may well be considered the emblem of the slow triumph
of Impressionism, and of the amends for a great injustice.
It is in this picture that the young painter Bazille is represented, a
friend and pupil of Manet’s, who was killed during the war of 1870, and
who should not be forgotten here. He has left a few canvases marked by
great talent, and would no doubt have counted among the most original
contemporary artists. We shall terminate this all too short enumeration
with two remarkable landscapists; the one is Albert Lebourg who paints
in suave and poetic colour schemes, with blues and greens of particular
tenderness, a painter who will take his place in the history of
Impressionism. The other is Eugène Boudin. He has not adopted Claude
Monet’s technique; but I have already said that the vague and inexact
term “Impressionism” must be understood to comprise a group of
painters showing originality in the study of light and getting away from
the academic spirit. As to this, Eugène Boudin deserves to be placed in
the first rank. His canvases will be the pride of the best arranged
galleries. He is an admirable seascape painter. He has known how to
render with unfailing mastery, the grey waters of the Channel, the stormy
skies, the heavy clouds, the effects of sunlight feebly piercing the
prevailing grey. His numerous pictures painted at the port of Havre are
profoundly expressive. Nobody has excelled him in drawing sailing-
boats, in giving the exact feeling of the keels plunged into the water, in
grouping the masts, in rendering the activity of a port, in indicating the
value of a sail against the sky, the fluidity of calm water, the melancholy
of the distance, the shiver of short waves rippled by the breeze. Boudin is
a learned colourist of grey tones. His Impressionism consists in the
exclusion of useless details, his comprehension of reflections, his feeling
for values, the boldness of his composition and his faculty of directly
perceiving nature and the transparency of atmosphere: he reminds
sometimes of Constable and of Corot. Boudin’s production has been
enormous, and nothing that he has done is indifferent. He is one of those
artists who have not a brilliant career, but who will last, and whose
name, faithfully retained by the elect, is sure of immortality. He may be
considered an isolated artist, on the border line between Classicism and
Impressionism, and this is unquestionably the cause of the comparative
obscurity of his fame. The same might be said of the ingenuous and fine
landscapist Hervier, who has left such interesting canvases; and of the
Lyons water-colour painter Ravier who, almost absolutely unknown,
came very close to Monticelli and showed admirable gifts. It must,
however, be recognised that Boudin is nearer to Impressionism than to
any other grouping of artists, and he must be considered as a small
master of pure French lineage. Finally, if a question of nationality
prevents me from enlarging upon the subject of the rank of precursor
which must be accorded to the great Dutch landscapist Jongkind, I must
at least mention his name. His water-colour sketches have been veritable
revelations for several Impressionists. Eugène Boudin and Berthe
Morisot have derived special benefit from them, and they are valuable
lessons for many young painters of the present day.
 JONGKIND — IN HOLLAND

JONGKIND — VIEW OF THE HAGUE

We do not pretend to have mentioned in this chapter all the painters
directly connected with the first Impressionist movement. We have
confined ourselves to enumerating the most important only, and each of
them would deserve a complete essay. But our object will have been
achieved, if we have inspired art-lovers with just esteem for this brave
phalanx of artists who have proved better than any aesthetic
commentaries the vitality, the originality, and the logic of Manet’s
theories, the great importance of the notions introduced by him into
painting, and who have, on the other hand, clearly demonstrated the
uselessness of official teaching. Far from the traditions and methods of
the School, the best of their knowledge and of their talent is due to their
profound and sincere contemplation of nature and to their freedom of
spirit. And for that reason they will have a permanent place in the
evolution of their art.
 VIII THE MODERN ILLUSTRATORS
CONNECTED WITH IMPRESSIONISM:

RAFFAËLLI, TOULOUSE-LAUTREC, FORAIN, CHÉRET, ETC.

Not the least important result of Impressionism has been the veritable
revolution effected by it in the art of illustration. It was only natural that
its principles should have led to it. The substitution of the beauty of
character for the beauty of proportion was bound to move the artists to
regard illustration in a new light; and as pictorial Impressionism was
born of the same movement of ideas which created the naturalist novel
and the impressionist literature of Flaubert, Zola and the Goncourts, and
moreover as these men were united by close relations and a common
defence, Edouard Manet’s modern ideas soon took up the commentary of
the books dealing with modern life and the description of actual
spectacles.
The Impressionists themselves have not contributed towards
illustration. Their work has consisted in raising to the style of grand
painting subjects, that seemed at the best only worthy of the proportion
of vignettes, in opposition to the subjects qualified as “noble” by the
School. The series of works by Manet and Degas may be considered as
admirable illustrations to the novels by Zola and the Goncourts. It is a
parallel research in modern psychologic truth. But this research has
remained confined to pictures. It may be presumed that, had they wished
to do so, Manet and Degas could have admirably illustrated certain
contemporary novels, and Renoir could have produced a masterpiece in
commenting, say, upon Verlaine’s Fêtes Galantes. The only things that
can be mentioned here are a few drawings composed by Manet for Edgar
A. Poe’s The Raven and Mallarmé’s L’Après-Midi d’un Faune, in
addition to a few music covers without any great interest.
But if the Impressionists themselves have neglected actively to assist
the interesting school of modern illustration, a whole legion of
draughtsmen have immediately been inspired by their principles. One of
their most original characteristics was the realistic representation of the
scenes, the mise en cadre, and it afforded these draughtsmen an
opportunity for revolutionising book illustration. There had already been
some excellent artists who occupied themselves with vignette drawings,
like Tony Johannot and Célestin Nanteuil, whose pretty and smart
frontispieces are to be found in the old editions of Balzac. The genius of
Honoré Daumier and the high fancy of Gavarni and of Grévin had
already announced a serious protest of modern sentiment against
academic taste, in returning on many points to the free tradition of Eisen,
of the two Moreaus and of Debucourt. Since 1845 the draughtsman
Constantin Guys, Baudelaire’s friend, gave evidence, in his most
animated water-colour drawings, of a curious vision of nervous elegance
and of expressive skill quite in accord with the ideas of the day.
Impressionism, and also the revelation of the Japanese colour prints,
gave an incredible vigour to these intuitive glimpses. Certain
characteristics will date from the days of Impressionism. It is due to
Impressionism that artists have ventured to show in illustration, for
instance, figures in the foreground cut through by the margin, rising
perspectives, figures in the background that seem to stand on a higher
plane than the others, people seen from a second story; in a word, all that
life presents to our eyes, without the annoying consideration for “style”
and for arrangement, which the academic spirit obstinately insisted to
apply to the illustration of modern life. Degas in particular has given
many examples of this novelty in composition. One of his pastels has
remained typical, owing to the scandal caused by it: he represents a
dance-scene at the Opera, seen from the orchestra. The neck of a double
bass rises in the middle of the picture and cuts into it, a large black
silhouette, behind which sparkle the gauze-dresses and the lights. That
can be observed any evening, and yet it would be difficult to recapitulate
all the railleries and all the anger caused by so natural an audacity.
Modern illustration was to be the pretext of a good many more outbursts!
We must now consider four artists of great importance who are
remarkable painters and have greatly raised the art of illustration. This
title illustrator, despised by the official painters, should be given them as
the one which has secured them the best claim to fame. They have
restored to this title all its merit and all its brilliancy and have introduced
into illustration the most serious qualities of painting. Of these four men
the first in date is M.J.F. Raffaëlli, who introduced himself about 1875
with some remarkable and intensely picturesque illustrations in colours
in various magazines. He gave an admirable series of Parisian Types, in
album form, and a series of etchings to accompany the text of M.
Huysmans, describing the curious river “la Bièvre” which penetrates
Paris in a thousand curves, sometimes subterranean, sometimes above
ground, and serves the tanners for washing the leather. This series is a
model of modern illustration. But, apart from the book, the entire
pictorial work of M. Raffaëlli is a humorous and psychological
illustration of the present time. He has painted with unique truth and
spirit the working men’s types and the small bourgeois, the poor, the
hospital patients and the roamers of the outskirts of Paris. He has
succeeded in being the poet of the sickly and dirty landscapes by which
the capitals are surrounded; he has rendered their anaemic charm, the
confused perspectives of houses, fences, walls and little gardens, and
their smoke, under the melancholy of rainy skies. With an irony free
from bitterness he has noted the clumsy gestures of the labourer in his
Sunday garb and the grotesque silhouettes of the small townsmen, and
has compiled a gallery of very real sociologic interest. M. Raffaëlli has
also exhibited Parisian landscapes in which appear great qualities of
light. He excels in rendering the mornings in the spring, with their pearly
skies, their pale lights, their transparency and their slight shadows, and
finally he has proved his mastery by some large portraits, fresh
harmonies, generally devoted to the study of different qualities of white.
If the name “Impressionist” meant, as has been wrongly believed, an
artist who confines himself to giving the impression of what he sees,
then M. Raffaëlli would be the real Impressionist. He suggests more than
he paints. He employs a curious technique: he often leaves a sky
completely bare, throwing on to the white of the canvas a few colour
notes which suffice to give the illusion. He has a decided preference for
white and black, and paints very slightly in small touches. His very
correct feeling for values makes him an excellent painter; but what
interests him beyond all, is psychologic expression. He notes it with so
hasty a pencil, that one might almost say that he writes with colour. He is
also an etcher of great merit, and an original sculptor. He has invented
small bas-reliefs in bronze which can be attached to the wall, like
sketches or nick-nacks; and he has applied his talent even to renewing
the material for painting. He is an ingenious artist and a prolific
producer, a roguish, but sympathetic, observer of the life of the small
people, which has not prevented him from painting very seriously when
he wanted to, as is witnessed among other works by his very fine portrait
of M. Clemenceau speaking at a public meeting, in the presence of a
vociferous audience from which rise some hundred of heads whose
expressions are noted with really splendid energy and fervour.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who died recently, insane, leaves a great
work behind him. He had a kind of cruel genius. Descended from one of
the greatest families of France, badly treated by nature who made him a
kind of ailing dwarf, he seemed to take a bitter pleasure in the study of
modern vice. He painted scenes at café-concerts and the rooms of
wantons with intense truth. Nobody has revealed better than he the
lowness and suffering of the creatures “of pleasure,” as they have been
dubbed by the heartrending irony of life. Lautrec has shown the
artificiality of the painted faces; the vulgarity of the types of the
prostitutes of low origin; the infamous gestures, the disorder, the
slovenliness of the dwellings of these women; all the shady side of their
existence. It has been said that he loved ugliness. As a matter of fact, he
did not exaggerate, he raised a powerful accusation against everything he
saw. But his terrible clairvoyance passed for caricature. This sad
psychologist was a great painter; he pleased himself with dressing in
rose-coloured costumes the coarsest and most vulgar creatures he
painted, such as one can find at the cabarets and concerts, and he enjoyed
the contrast of fresh tones with the faces marked by vice and poverty;
Lautrec’s two great influences have been the Japanese and Degas. Of the
former he retained the love for decorative arabesques and the
unconventional grouping; of the other the learned draughtsmanship,
expressive in its broad simplification, and one might say that the pupil
has often been worthy of the masters. One can only regret that Lautrec
should have confined his vision and his high faculties to the study of a
small and very Parisian world; but, seeing his works, one cannot deny
the science, the spirit and the grand bearing of his art. He has also signed
some fine posters, notably a Bruant which is a masterpiece of its kind.
Degas’s deep influence can be found again in J.L. Forain, who has
made himself known by an immense series of drawings for the illustrated
papers, drawings as remarkable in themselves as they are, through their
legends, bitterly sarcastic in spirit. These drawings form a synthesis of
the defects of the bourgeoisie, which is at the same time amusing and
grave. They also concern, though less happily, the political world, in
which the artist, a little intoxicated with his success, has thought himself
able to exercise an influence by scoffing at the parliamentary régime.
Forain’s drawing has a nervous character which does, however, not
weaken its science: every stroke reveals something and has an
astonishing power. In his less known painting can be traced still more
clearly the style and influence of his master Degas. They are generally
incidents behind the scenes and at night restaurants, where caricatured
types are painted with great force. But they are insistently exaggerated,
they have not the restraint, the ironical and discreet plausibility, which
give so much flavour, so much value to Degas’s studies. Nevertheless,
Forain’s pictures are very significant and are of real interest. He is
decidedly the most interesting newspaper illustrator of his whole
generation, the one whose ephemeral art most closely approaches grand
painting, and one of those who have most contributed towards the
transformation of illustration for the contemporary press.
Jules Chéret has made for himself an important and splendid position
in contemporary art. He commenced as a lithographic workman and
lived for a long time in London. About 1870 Chéret designed his first
posters in black, white and red; these were at the time the only colours
used. By and by he perfected this art and found the means of adding
other tones and of drawing them on the lithographic stone. He returned
to France, started a small studio, and gradually carried poster art to the
admirable point at which it has arrived. At the same time Chéret drew
and painted and composed himself his models. About 1885 his name
became famous, and it has not ceased growing since. Some writers,
notably the eminent critic Roger Marx and the novelist Huysmans, hailed
in Chéret an original artist as well as a learned technician. He then
exhibited decorative pictures, pastels and drawings, which placed him in
the first rank. Chéret is universally known. The type of the Parisian
woman created by him, and the multi-coloured harmony of his works
will not be forgotten. His will be the honour of having invented the
artistic poster, this feast for the eyes, this fascinating art of the street,
which formerly languished in a tedious and dull display of commercial
advertisements. He has been the promoter of an immense movement; he
has been imitated, copied, parodied, but he will always remain
inimitable. He has succeeded in realising on paper by means of
lithography, the pastels and gouache drawings in which his admirable
colourist’s fancy mixed the most difficult shades. In Chéret can be found
all the principles of Impressionism: opposing lights, coloured shadows,
complementary reflections, all employed with masterly sureness and
delightful charm. It is decorative Impressionism, conceived in a superior
way; and this simple poster-man, despised by the painters, has proved
himself equal to most. He has transformed the street, in the open light,
into a veritable Salon, where his works have become famous. When this
too modest artist decided to show his pictures and drawings, they were a
revelation. The most remarkable pastellists of the period were astonished
and admired his skill, his profound knowledge of technique, his
continual tours-de-force which he disguised under a shimmering
gracefulness. The State had the good sense to entrust him with some
large mural decorations, in which he unfolded the scale of his sparkling
colours, and affirmed his spirit, his fancy and his dreamy art. Chéret’s
harmonies remain secrets; he uses them for the representation of
characters from the Italian comedy, thrown with fiendish verve upon a
background of a sky, fiery with the Bengal lights of a fairy-like carnival,
and he strangely intermingles the reality of the movements with the most
arbitrary fancy. Chéret has also succeeded in proving his artistic descent
by a beautiful series of drawings in sanguine: he descends from Watteau,
Boucher and Fragonard; he is a Frenchman of pure blood; and when one
has done admiring the grace and the happy animation of his imagination,
one can only be surprised to see on what serious and sure a technique are
based these decorations which appear improvised. Chéret’s art is the
smile of Impressionism and the best demonstration of the decorative
logic of this art.
These are the four artists of great merit who have created the transition
between Impressionist painting and illustration. It would be fit to put
aside Toulouse-Lautrec, who was much younger, but his work is too
directly connected with that of Degas for one to take into account the
difference of age. He produced between 1887 and 1900 works which
might well have been ante-dated by fifteen years. We shall study in the
next chapter his Neo-Impressionist comrades, and we shall now speak of
some illustrators more advanced in years than he. The oldest in date is
the engraver Henri Guérard, who died three years ago. He had married
Eva Gonzalès and was a friend of Manet’s, many of whose works have
been engraved by him. He was an artist of decided and original talent,
who also occupied himself successfully with pyrogravure, and who was
happily inspired by the Japanese colour-prints. His etchings deserve a
place of honour in the folios of expert collectors; they are strong and
broad. As to the engraver Félix Buhot, he was a rather delicate colourist
in black and white; his Paris scenes will always be considered charming
works. In spite of his Spanish origin, the painter, aquarelliste, and
draughtsman Daniel Vierge, should be added to the list of the men
connected with Impressionism. His illustrations are those of a great artist
— admirable in colour, movement and observation; all the great
principles of Impressionism are embodied in them. But there are four
more illustrators of the first rank: Steinlen, Louis Legrand, Paul
Renouard and Auguste Lepère.
Steinlen has been enormously productive: he is specially remarkable
for his illustrations. Those which he has designed for Aristide Bruant’s
volume of songs, Dans la rue, are masterpieces of their kind. They
contain treasures of bitter observation, quaintness and knowledge. The
soul of the lower classes is shown in them with intense truth, bitter revolt
and comprehensive philosophy. Steinlen has also designed some
beautiful posters, pleasing pastels, lithographs of incontestable technical
merit, and beautifully eloquent political drawings. It cannot be said that
he is an Impressionist in the strict sense of the word; he applied his
colour in flat tints, more like an engraver than a painter; but in him too
can be felt the stamp of Degas, and he is one of those who best
demonstrate that, without Impressionism, they could not have been what
they are.
The same may be said of Louis Legrand, a pupil of Félicien Rops, an
admirably skilful etcher, a draughtsman of keen vision, and a painter of
curious character, who has in many ways forestalled the artists of to-day.
Louis Legrand also shows to what extent the example of Manet and
Degas has revolutionised the art of illustration, in freeing the painters
from obsolete laws, and guiding them towards truth and frank
psychological study. Legrand is full of them, without resembling them.
We must not forget that, besides the technical innovation (division of
tones, study of complementary colours), Impressionism has brought us
novelty of composition, realism of character and great liberty in the
choice of subjects. From this point of view Rops himself, in spite of his
symbolist tendencies, could not be classed with any other group, if it
were not that any kind of classification in art is useless and inaccurate.
However that may be, Louis Legrand has signed some volumes
resplendent with the most seductive qualities.
Paul Renouard has devoted himself to newspaper illustration, but with
what surprising prodigality of spirit and knowledge! The readers of the
“Graphic” will know. This masterly virtuoso of the pencil might give
drawing-lessons to many members of the Institute! The feeling for the
life of crowds, psychology of types, spirited and rapid notation,
astonishing ease in overcoming difficulties — these are his undeniable
gifts. And again we must recognise in Renouard the example of Degas
and Manet. His exceptional fecundity only helps to give more authority
to his pencil. Renouard’s drawings at the Exhibition of 1900 were,
perhaps, more beautiful than the rest of his work. There was notably a
series of studies made from the first platform of the Eiffel Tower, an
accumulation of wonders of perspectives framing scenes of such
animation and caprice as to take away one’s breath.
Finally, Auguste Lepère appears as the Debucourt of our time. As
painter, pastellist and wood-engraver he has produced since 1870, and
has won for himself the first place among French engravers. It would be
difficult to recount the volumes, albums and covers on which the fancy
of his burin has played; but it is particularly in wood-engraving that he
stands without rival. Not only has he produced masterpieces of it, but he
has passionately devoted himself to raising this admirable art, the glory
of the beautiful books of olden days, and to give back to it the lustre
which had been eclipsed by mechanical processes. Lepère has started
some publications for this purpose; he has had pupils of great merit, and
he must be considered the master of the whole generation of modern
wood-engravers, just as Chéret is the undisputed master of the poster.
Lepère’s ruling quality is strength. He seems to have rediscovered the
mediaeval limners’ secrets of cutting the wood, giving the necessary
richness to the ink, creating a whole scale of half-tones, and specially of
adapting the design to typographic printing, and making of it, so to say,
an ornament and a decorative extension for the type. Lepère is a wood-
engraver with whom none of his contemporaries can be compared; as
regards his imagination, it is that of an altogether curious artist. He
excels in composing and expressing the life, the animation, the soul of
the streets and the picturesque side of the populace. Herein he is much
inspired by Manet and, if we go back to the real tradition, by Guys,
Debucourt, the younger Moreau and by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin. He is
decidedly a Realist of French lineage, who owes nothing to the Academy
and its formulas.
It would be evidently unreasonable to attach to Impressionism all that
is ante-academical, and between the two extremes there is room for a
crowd of interesting artists. We shall not succumb to the prejudice of the
School by declaring, in our turn, that there is no salvation outside
Impressionism, and we have been careful to state repeatedly that, if
Impressionism has a certain number of principles as kernel, its
applications and its influence have a radiation which it is difficult to
limit. What can be absolutely demonstrated is, that this movement has
had the greatest influence on modern illustration, sometimes through its
colouring, sometimes simply through the great freedom of its ideas.
Some have found in it a direct lesson, others an example to be followed.
Some have met in it technical methods which pleased them, others have
only taken some suggestions from it. That is the case, for instance, with
Legrand, with Steinlen, and with Renouard; and it is also the case with
the lithographer Odilon Redon, who applies the values of Manet and, in
his strange pastels, the harmonies of Degas and Renoir, placing them at
the service of dreams and hallucinations and of a symbolism which is
absolutely removed from the realism of these painters. It is, finally, the
case with the water-colour painter Henri Rivière, who is misjudged as to
his merit, and who is one of the most perfect of those who have applied
Impressionist ideas to decorative engraving. He has realised images in
colours destined to decorate inexpensively the rooms of the people and
recalling the grand aspects of landscapes with a broad simplification
which is derived, curiously enough, from Puvis de Chavannes’s large
decorative landscapes and from the small and precise colour prints of
Japan. Rivière, who is a skilful and personal poetic landscapist, is not
exactly an Impressionist, in so far as he does not divide the tones, but
rather blends them in subtle mixtures in the manner of the Japanese. Yet,
seeing his work, one cannot help thinking of all the surprise and freedom
introduced into modern art by Impressionism.
Everybody, even the ignorant, can perceive, on looking through an
illustrated paper or a modern volume, that thirty years ago this manner of
placing the figures, of noting familiar gestures, and of seizing fugitive
life with spirit and clearness was unknown. This mass of engravings and
of sketches resembles in no way what had been seen formerly. They no
longer have the solemn air of classic composition, by which the drawings
had been affected. A current of bold spontaneity has passed through
here. In modern English illustration, it can be stated indisputably that
nothing would be such as it can now be seen, if Morris, Rossetti and
Crane had not imposed their vision, and yet many talented Englishmen
resemble these initiators only very remotely. It is exactly in this sense
that we shall have credited Impressionism with the talents who have
drawn their inspiration less from its principles, than from its vigorous
protest against mechanical formulas, and who have been able to find the
energy, necessary for their success, in the example it set by fighting
during twenty years against the ideas of routine which seemed
indestructible. Even with the painters who are far removed from the
vision and the colouring of Manet and Degas, of Monet and Renoir, one
can find a very precise tendency: that of returning to the subjects and the
style of the real national tradition; and herein lies one of the most serious
benefits bestowed by Impressionism upon an art which had stopped at
the notion of a canonical beauty, until it had almost become sterile in its
timidity.
 IX NEO-IMPRESSIONISM

GAUGUIN, DENIS, THÉO VAN RYSSELBERGHE — THE THEORY OF POINTILLISM

— SEURAT, SIGNAC AND THE THEORIES OF SCIENTIFIC CHROMATISM — FAULTS
AND QUALITIES OF THE IMPRESSIONIST MOVEMENT, WHAT WE OWE TO IT, ITS
PLACE IN THE HISTORY OF THE FRENCH SCHOOL — SOME WORDS ON ITS
INFLUENCE ABROAD

The beginnings of the movement designated under the name of Neo-

Impressionism can be traced back to about 1880. The movement is a
direct offshoot of the first Impressionism, originated by a group of young
painters who admired it and thought of pushing further still its chromatic
principles. The flourishing of Impressionism coincided, as a matter of
fact, with certain scientific labours concerning optics. Helmholtz had just
published his works on the perception of colours and sounds by means of
waves. Chevreul had continued on this path by establishing his beautiful
theories on the analysis of the solar spectrum. M. Charles Henry, an
original and remarkable spirit, occupied himself in his turn with these
delicate problems by applying them directly to aesthetics, which
Helmholtz and Chevreul had not thought of doing. M. Charles Henry had
the idea of creating relations between this branch of science and the laws
of painting. As a friend of several young painters he had a real influence
over them, showing them that the new vision due to the instinct of Monet
and of Manet might perhaps be scientifically verified, and might
establish fixed principles in a sphere where hitherto the laws of colouring
had been the effects of individual conception. At that moment the
criticism which resulted from Taine’s theories tried to effect a
rapprochement of the artistic and scientific domains in criticism and in
the psychologic novel. The painters, too, gave way to this longing for
precision which seems to have been the great preoccupation of intellects
from 1880 to about 1889.
Their researches had a special bearing on the theory of complementary
colours and on the means of establishing some laws concerning the
reaction of tones in such manner as to draw up a kind of tabula. Georges
Seurat and Paul Signac were the promoters of this research. Seurat died
very young, and one cannot but regret this death of an artist who would
have been very interesting and capable of beautiful works. Those which
he has left us bear witness to a spirit very receptive to theories, and
leaving nothing to chance. The silhouettes are reduced to almost
rigorously geometrical principles, the tones are decomposed
systematically. These canvases are more reasoned examples than works
of intuition and spontaneous vision. They show Seurat’s curious desire to
give a scientific and classic basis to Impressionism. The same idea rules
in all the work of Paul Signac, who has painted some portraits and
numerous landscapes. To these two painters is due the method of
Pointillism, i.e. the division of tones, not only by touches, as in Monet’s
pictures, but by very small touches of equal size, causing the spheric
shape to act equally upon the retina. The accumulation of these luminous
points is carried out over the entire surface of the canvas without thick
daubs of paint, and with regularity, whilst with Manet the paint is more
or less dense. The theory of complementary colours is systematically
applied. On a sketch, made from nature, the painter notes the principal
relations of tones, then systematises them on his picture and connects
them by different shades which should be their logical result. Neo-
Impressionism believes in obtaining thus a greater exactness than that
which results from the individual temperament of the painter who simply
relies on his own perception. And it is true, in theory, that such a
conception is more exact. But it reduces the picture to a kind of theorem,
which excludes all that constitutes the value and charm of an art, that is
to say: caprice, fancy, and the spontaneity of personal inspiration. The
works of Seurat, Signac, and of the few men who have strictly followed
the rules of Pointillism are lacking in life, in surprise, and make a
somewhat tiring impression upon one’s eyes. The uniformity of the
points does not succeed in giving an impression of cohesion, and even
less a suggestion of different textures, even if the values are correct.
Manet seems to have attained perfection in using the method which
consists in directing the touches in accordance with each of the planes,
and this is evidently the most natural method. Scientific Chromatism
constitutes an ensemble of propositions, of which art will be able to
make use, though indirectly, as information useful for a better
understanding of the laws of light in presence of nature. What Pointillism
has been able to give us, is a method which would be very appreciable
for decorative paintings seen from a great distance — friezes or ceilings
in spacious buildings. It would in this case return to the principle of
mosaic, which is the principle par excellence of mural art.
The Pointillists have to-day almost abandoned this transitional theory
which, in spite of the undeniable talent of its adepts, has only produced
indifferent results as regards easel pictures. Besides Seurat and Signac,
mention should be made of Maurice Denis, Henri-Edmond Cross,
Angrand, and Théo Van Rysselberghe. But this last-named and Maurice
Denis have arrived at great talent by very different merits. M. Maurice
Denis has abandoned Pointillism a few years ago, in favour of returning
to a very strange conception which dates back to the Primitives, and even
to Giotto. He simplifies his drawing archaically, suppresses all but the
indispensable detail, and draws inspiration from Gothic stained glass and
carvings, in order to create decorative figures with clearly marked
outlines which are filled with broad, flat tints. He generally treats mystic
subjects, for which this special manner is suitable. One cannot love the
parti pris of these works, but one cannot deny M. Denis a great charm of
naivete, an intense feeling for decorative arrangements and colouring of
a certain originality. He is almost a French pre-Raphaelite, and his
profound catholic faith inspires him nobly.

THÉO VAN RYSSELBERGHE — PORTRAITS OF MADAME VAN

RYSSELBERGHE AND HER DAUGHTER
M. Théo Van Rysselberghe continues to employ the Pointillist method.
But he is so strongly gifted, that one might almost say he succeeds in
revealing himself as a painter of great merit in spite of this dry and
charmless method. All his works are supported by broad and learned
drawing and his colour is naturally brilliant. M. Van Rysselberghe, a
prolific and varied worker, has painted nudes, large portraits, landscapes
with figures, seascapes, interiors and still-life, and in all this he evinces
faculties of the first order. He is a lover of light and understands how to
make it vibrate over flesh and fabrics. He is an artist who has the sense
of style. He has signed a certain number of portraits, whose beautiful
carriage and serious psychology would suffice to make him be
considered as the most significant of the Neo-Impressionists. It is really
in him that one has to see the young and worthy heir of Monet, of Sisley,
and of Degas, and that is why we have insisted on adding here to the
works of these masters the reproduction of one of his. M. Van
Rysselberghe is also a very delicate etcher who has signed some fine
works in this method, and his seascapes, whether they revel in the pale
greys of the German Ocean or in the warm sapphire and gold harmonies
of the Mediterranean, count among the finest of the time; they are
windows opened upon joyous brightness.
To these painters who have never taken part at the Salons, and are only
to be seen at the exhibitions of the Indépendants (except M. Denis), must
be added M. Pierre Bonnard, who has given proof to his charm and
fervour in numerous small canvases of Japanese taste; and M. Edouard
Vuillard, who is a painter of intimate scenes of rare delicacy. This artist,
who stands apart and produces very little, has signed some interiors of
melancholic distinction and of a colouring which revels in low tones. He
has the precision and skill of a master. There is in him, one might say, a
reflection of Chardin’s soul. Unfortunately his works are confined to a
few collections and have not become known to the public. To the same
group belong M. Ranson, who has devoted himself to purely decorative
art, tapestry, wall papers and embroideries; M. Georges de Feure, a
strange, symbolist water-colour painter, who has become one of the best
designers of the New Art in France; M. Félix Vallotton, painter and
lithographer, who is somewhat heavy, but gifted with serious qualities. It
is true that M. de Feure is Dutch, M. Vallotton Swiss, and M. Van
Rysselberghe Belgian; but they have settled down in France, and are
sufficiently closely allied to the Neo-Impressionist movement so that the
question of nationality need not prevent us from mentioning them here.
Finally it is impossible not to say a few words about two pupils of
Gustave Moreau’s, who have both become noteworthy followers of
Impressionism of very personal individuality. M. Eugène Martel bids fair
to be one of the best painters of interiors of his generation. He has the
feeling of mystical life and paints the peasantry with astonishing
psychologic power. His vigorous colouring links him to Monticelli, and
his drawing to Degas. As to M. Simon Bussy who, following Alphonse
Legros’s example, is about to make an enviable position for himself in
England, he is an artist of pure blood. His landscapes and his figures
have the distinction and rare tone of M. Whistler, besides the
characteristic acuteness of Degas. His harmonies are subtle, his vision
novel, and he will certainly develop into an important painter. Together
with Henri le Sidaner and Jacques Blanche, Simon Bussy is decidedly
the most personal of that young generation of “Intimists” who seem to
have retained the best principles of the Impressionist masters to employ
them for the expression of a psychologic ideal which is very different
from Realism.
Outside this group there are still a few isolated painters who are
difficult to classify. The very young artists Laprade and Charles Guérin
have shown for the last three years, at the exhibition of the Indépendants,
some works which are the worthy result of Manet’s and Renoir’s
influence. They, too, justify great expectations. The landscapists Paul
Vogler and Maxime Maufra, more advanced in years, have made
themselves known by some solid series of vigorously presented
landscapes. To them must be added M. Henry Moret, M. Albert André
and M. Georges d’Espagnet, who equally deserve the success which has
commenced to be their share. But there are some older ones. It is only his
due, that place should be given to a painter who committed suicide after
an unhappy life, and who evinced splendid gifts. Vincent Van Gogh, a
Dutchman, who, however, had always worked in France, has left to the
world some violent and strange works, in which Impressionism appears
to have reached the limits of its audacity. Their value lies in their naïve
frankness and in the undauntable determination which tried to fix
without trickery the sincerest feelings. Amidst many faulty and clumsy
works, Van Gogh has also left some really beautiful canvases. There is a
deep affinity between him and Cézanne. A very real affinity exists, too,
between Paul Gauguin, who was a friend and to a certain extent the
master of Van Gogh, and Cézanne and Renoir. Paul Gauguin’s robust
talent found its first motives in Breton landscapes, in which the method
of colour-spots can be found employed with delicacy and placed at the
service of a rather heavy, but very interesting harmony. Then the artist
spent a long time in Tahiti, whence he returned with a completely
transformed manner. He has brought back from these regions some
landscapes with figures treated in intentionally clumsy and almost wild
fashion. The figures are outlined in firm strokes and painted in broad, flat
tints on canvas which has the texture almost of tapestry. Many of these
works are made repulsive by their aspect of multi-coloured, crude and
barbarous imagery. Yet one cannot but acknowledge the fundamental
qualities, the beautiful values, the ornamental taste, and the impression
of primitive animalism. On the whole, Paul Gauguin has a beautiful,
artistic temperament which, in its aversion to virtuosoship, has perhaps
not sufficiently understood that the fear of formulas, if exaggerated, may
lead to other formulas, to a false ignorance which is as dangerous as false
knowledge. Gauguin’s symbolical intentions, like those of his pupil
Emile Bernard, are sincere, but are badly served by minds which do not
agree with their technical qualities, and both Gauguin and Emile Bernard
are most happily inspired when they are painters pure and simple.
Next to Gauguin, among the seniors of the present generation and the
successors of Impressionism, should be placed the landscapist Armand
Guillaumin who, without possessing Sisley’s delicate qualities, has
painted some canvases worthy of notice; and we must, finally, terminate
this far too summary enumeration by referring to one of the most gifted
painters of the French School of the day, M. Louis Anquetin. His is a
most varied talent whose power is unquestionable. He made his début
among the Neo-Impressionists and revealed the influence upon him of
the Japanese and of Degas. It may be seen that these two influences
predominate in the whole group. Then M. Anquetin became fascinated
by the breadth and superb freedom of Manet’s works, and signed a series
of portraits and sketches, some of which are not far below so great a
master’s. They are works which will surprise the critics, when our
contemporary painting will be examined with calm impartiality. After
these works, M. Anquetin gave way to his impetuous nature which led
him to decorative painting, and he became influenced by Rubens,
Jordaens, and the Fontainebleau School. He painted theatre curtains and
mythological scenes, in which he gave free rein to his sensual
imagination. In spite of some admirable qualities, it seems as though the
artist had strayed from his true path in painting these brilliant, but
somewhat declamatory works, and he has since returned to a more
modern and more direct painting. In all his changed conditions Anquetin
has shown a considerable talent, pleasing in its fine vigour, impetuosity,
brilliancy and sincerity. His inequality is perhaps the cause of his relative
want of success; it has put the public off, but nevertheless in certain of
this brave and serious painter’s canvases can be seen the happy influence
of Manet.
It seems to us only right to sum up our impartial opinion of Neo-
Impressionism by saying that it has lacked cohesion, that Pointillism in
particular has led painting into an aimless path. It has been wrong to see
in Impressionism too exclusive a pretext for technical researches, and a
happy reaction has set in, which leads us back to-day, after diverse
tentative efforts (amongst others some unfortunate attempts at symbolist
painting), to the fine, recent school of the “Intimists” and to the novel
conception which a great and glorious painter, Besnard, imposes upon
the Salons, where the elect draw inspiration from him. We can here only
indicate with a few words the considerable part played by Besnard: his
clever work has proved that the scientific colour principles of
Impressionism may be applied, not to realism, but to the highest
thoughts, to ideologic painting most nobly inspired by the modern
intellectual preoccupations. He is the transition between Impressionism
and the art of to-morrow. Of pure French lineage by his portraits and his
nudes, which descend directly from Largillière and Ingres, he might have
restricted himself to being placed among the most learned
Impressionists. His studies of reflections and of complementary colours
speak for this. But he has passed this phase and has, with his decorations,
returned to the psychical domain of his strangely beautiful art. The
“Intimists,” C. Cottet, Simon, Blanche, Ménard, Bussy, Lobre, Le
Sidaner, Wéry, Prinet, and Ernest Laurent, have proved that they have
profited by Impressionism, but have proceeded in quite a different
direction in trying to translate their real perceptions. Some isolated
artists, like the decorative painter Henri Martin, who has enormous
talent, have applied the Impressionist technique to the expression of
grand allegories, rather in the manner of Puvis de Chavannes. The effort
at getting away from mere cleverness and escaping a too exclusive
preoccupation with technique, and at the same time acquiring serious
knowledge, betrays itself in the whole position of the young French
School; and this will furnish us with a perfectly natural conclusion, of
which the following are the principal points: —
What we shall have to thank Impressionism for, will be moral and
material advantages of considerable importance. Morally it has rendered
an immense service to all art, because it has boldly attacked routine and
proved by the whole of its work that a combination of independent
producers could renew the aesthetic code of a country, without owing
anything to official encouragement. It has succeeded where important
but isolated creators have succumbed, because it has had the good
fortune of uniting a group of gifted men, four of whom will count among
the greatest French artists since the origin of national art. It has had the
qualities which overcome the hardest resistance: fecundity, courage and
sure originality. It has known how to find its strength by referring to the
true traditions of the national genius, which have happily enlightened it
and saved it from fundamental errors. It has, last, but not least, inflicted
an irremediable blow on academic convention and has wrested from it
the prestige of teaching which ruled tyrannically for centuries past over
the young artists. It has laid a violent hand upon a tenacious and
dangerous prejudice, upon a series of conventional notions which were
transmitted without consideration for the evolution of modern life and
intelligence. It has dared freely to protest against a degenerated ideal
which vainly parodied the old masters, pretending to honour them. It has
removed from the artistic soul of France a whole order of pseudo-classic
elements which worked against its blossoming, and the School will never
recover from this bold contradiction which has rallied to it all the
youthful. The moral principle of Impressionism has been absolutely
logical and sane, and that is why nothing has been able to prevent its
triumph.
Technically Impressionism has brought a complete renewal of pictorial
vision, substituting the beauty of character for the beauty of proportions
and finding adequate expression for the ideas and feelings of its time,
which constitutes the secret of all beautiful works. It has taken up again a
tradition and added to it a contemporary page. It will have to be thanked
for an important series of observations as regards the analysis of light,
and for an absolutely original conception of drawing. Some years have
been wasted by painters of little worth in imitating it, and the Salons,
formerly encumbered with academic pastiches, have been encumbered
with Impressionist pastiches. It would be unfair to blame the
Impressionists for it. They have shown by their very career that they
hated teaching and would never pretend to teach. Impressionism is based
upon irrefutable optic laws, but it is neither a style, nor a method, likely
ever to become a formula in its turn. One may call upon this art for
examples, but not for receipts. On the contrary, its best teaching has been
to encourage artists to become absolutely independent and to search
ardently for their own individuality. It marks the decline of the School,
and will not create a new one which would soon become as fastidious as
the other. It will only appear, to those who will thoroughly understand it,
as a precious repertory of notes, and the young generation honours it
intelligently by not imitating it with servility.
Not that it is without its faults! It has been said, to belittle it, that it
only had the value of an interesting attempt, having only been able to
indicate some excellent intentions, without creating anything perfect.
This is inexact. It is absolutely evident, that Manet, Monet, Renoir and
Degas have signed some masterpieces which did not lose by comparison
with those in the Louvre, and the same might even be said of their less
illustrious friends. But it is also evident that the time spent on research as
well as on agitation and enervating controversies pursued during twenty-
five years, has been taken from men who could otherwise have done
better still. There has been a disparity between Realism and the
technique of Impressionism. Its realistic origin has sometimes made it
vulgar. It has often treated indifferent subjects in a grand style, and it has
too easily beheld life from the anecdotal side. It has lacked psychologic
synthesis (if we except Degas). It has too willingly denied all that exists
hidden under the apparent reality of the universe and has affected to
separate painting from the ideologic faculties which rule over all art.
Hatred of academic allegory, defiance of symbolism, abstraction and
romantic scenes, has led it to refuse to occupy itself with a whole order
of ideas, and it has had the tendency of making the painter beyond all a
workman. It was necessary at the moment of its arrival, but it is no
longer necessary now, and the painters understand this themselves.
Finally it has too often been superficial even in obtaining effects; it has
given way to the wish to surprise the eyes, of playing with tones merely
for love of cleverness. It often causes one regret to see symphonies of
magnificent colour wasted here in pictures of boating men; and there, in
pictures of café corners; and we have arrived at a degree of complex
intellectuality which is no longer satisfied with these rudimentary
themes. It has indulged in useless exaggerations, faults of composition
and of harmony, and all this cannot be denied.
But it still remains fascinating and splendid for its gifts which will
always rouse enthusiasm: freedom, impetuousness, youth, brilliancy,
fervour, the joy of painting and the passion for beautiful light. It is, on
the whole, the greatest pictorial movement that France has beheld since
Delacroix, and it brings to a finish gloriously the nineteenth century,
inaugurating the present. It has accomplished the great deed of having
brought us again into the presence of our true national lineage, far more
so than Romanticism, which was mixed with foreign elements. We have
here painting of a kind which could only have been conceived in France,
and we have to go right back to Watteau in order to receive again the
same impression. Impressionism has brought us an almost unhoped-for
renaissance, and this constitutes its most undeniable claim upon the
gratitude of the race.
It has exercised a very appreciable influence upon foreign painting.
Among the principal painters attracted by its ideas and research, we must
mention, in Germany, Max Liebermann and Kuehl; in Norway, Thaulow;
in Denmark, Kroyer; in Belgium, Théo Van Rysselberghe, Emile Claus,
Verheyden, Heymans, Verstraete, and Baertson; in Italy, Boldini,
Segantini, and Michetti; in Spain, Zuloaga, Sorolla y Bastida, Dario de
Regoyos and Rusiñol; in America, Alexander, Harrison, Sargent; and in
England, the painters of the Glasgow School, Lavery, Guthrie and the
late John Lewis Brown. All these men come within the active extension
of the French movement, and one may say that the honour of having first
recognised the truly national movement of this art must be given to those
foreign countries which have enriched their collections and museums
with works that were despised in the land which had witnessed their
birth. At the present moment the effects of this new vision are felt all
over the world, down to the very bosom of the academies; and at the
Salons, from which the Impressionists are still excluded, can be
witnessed an invasion of pictures inspired by them, which the most
retrograde juries dare not reject. In whatever measure the recent painters
accept Impressionism, they remain preoccupied with it, and even those
who love it not are forced to take it into account.
The Impressionist movement can therefore now be considered, apart
from all controversies, without vain attacks or exaggerated praise, as an
artistic manifestation which has entered the domain of history, and it can
be studied with the impartial application of the methods of critical
analysis which is usually employed in the study of the former art
movements. We shall not pretend to have given in these pages a
complete and faultless history; but we shall consider ourselves well
rewarded for this work, which is intended to reach the great public, if we
have roused their curiosity and sympathy with a group of artists whom
we consider admirable; and if we have rectified, in the eyes of the
readers of a foreign nation, the errors, the slanders, the undeserved
reproaches, with which Frenchmen have been pleased to overwhelm
sincere creators who thought with faith and love of the pure tradition of
the national genius, and who have for that reason been vilified as much
as if they had in an access of anarchical folly risen against the very
common sense, taste, reason and clearness, which will remain the eternal
merits of their soil. This small, imperfect volume will perhaps find its
best excuse in its intention of repairing an old injustice and of affirming
a useful and permanent truth: that of the authenticity of the classicism of
Impressionism, in the face of the false classicism of the academic world
which official honours have made the guardian of a French heritage,
whose soul it denied and whose spirit it deceived with its narrow and
cold formulas.
Giverny Church Cemetery — Monet’s final resting place
Monet’s grave