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Impressionism  Art 

KEY IMPRESSIONIST IDEAS

Impressionist painting styles directly contrasted the traditional brushwork and compositional techniques of the Romantic and Realism eras.

BRUSHWORK

Impressionists used looser and bolder brushstrokes. Impressionist painters used shorter brushstrokes and placed strokes of vastly different colors next to each other.

PERSPECTIVE

The artist’s role was to translate the world as it appeared directly. This perspective found beauty in the imperfections and momentary changes in the world around us.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Photographic development was an essential driving force behind much of the Impressionist philosophy, as is indebted to photography due to the concept of spontaneous composition.

En plein air

By painting outside, artists were able to observe and capture the world in different states, marking the passage of time. 

impression of a city

Impressionism was closely associated with Parisian society, and many artists documented the growing metropolitan nature of the city.

human body

The fascination with painting human forms also had a psychological facet for Impressionists.

women & the movement

Female Impressionists, like Berthe Morisot, focused on the private lives of late 19th century women.

famous artists from the movement

Édouard Manet  (1832 - 1883) Le Dejeuner sur l’Herbe (1863)

Claude Monet  (1840 - 1926) Impression, Sunrise (1872)

Mary Cassatt  (1844 - 1926) In the Loge  (1877 - 1878)

the development of post impressionism

When French Impressionism began to fade, the younger members of the group split off into various directions.  For Post-Impressionism to develop, there had to be a necessary divide in Impressionist thought.

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