Impressionism was a historic start that painters from France had the right to emerge as artists based on their loosened pigments, vibrant brushstrokes, romantic sentiments and naturalistic compositions.

1. ImpressionismImpressionism
Speaker:
Vincent LEE Kwun-
leung

2. Historical sequence
 Renaissance
 Rococo
 Impressionism
 Expressionism

3. Why was Rococo so important
to Impressionism?
 Rococo emerged once Fr. Gottfried
Wilhelm Leibniz introduced
“Chinoiserie” to Europe after his tributary
visit to Qing Regime.
 John Hay wrote vernacular literature to
glorify the Chinese golden vases. The
Baroque trend within Renaissance
absorbed silk, pottery and tea from China.

4. Why was Rococo so important
to Impressionism? (continued)
 The loosened pigments of Rococo
paintings in the 17th
century were inspired
by Chinese aesthetics, specifically the
ideas called “vividness of spiritual
essences” ( 氣韻生動 ) and “vibrancy of
structural brushworks” ( 骨法用筆 ) from
the Six Rules of Xie He ( 謝赫六法 ).

5. Rococo masterpiece: “Pilgrimage to Cythera”
 Artist / Patron: Jean-Antoine Watteau
 Date: 1721 A.D (18th
century, A.D) Original location: France

6. Monet:
Father of
Impressionism
 Title: Impression, Sunrise
 Artist / Patron: Claude Monet
 Date: 1873 A.D (19th
century A.D)
 Original location: France

7. Manet: Politically struggled for
equal treatment
 Situation: “Salon de Paris” organized by
Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1863.
– Both Claude Monet and Edouard Manet, as well
as their Impressionistic fellows, were rejected by the
jury panel from joining the “Salon de Paris”.
– “The Luncheon on the Grass” by Edouard Manet
was particularly criticized by the academists.
– Napoleon III appreciated the rejected works and
organized a “Salon des Refusés” for
accommodating the exhibitions related to
Impressionism. However, the advertising effect was
still not strong enough to re-modify the conservative
institutional restraints of the academists.

8. Manet: Politically struggled for
equal treatment (continued)
 Artists petitioned to Napoleon III and
requested for establishing a new “Salon
des Refusés”. But this petition was
refused.
 Manet, Renoir, Czanne, Edgar Degas and
so forth jointly formed an association
called “Société Anonyme Coopérative des
Artistes Peintres, Sculpteurs, Graveurs”
to exhibit their works independently.

9. The controversial piece of Manet that enlightened public
awareness on the alienated situation of Impressionistic
artists: “The Luncheon on the Grass”
 Title: “The
Luncheon on the
Grass”
 Artist / Patron:
Édouard Manet
 Date: 1863 A.D
(19th
century A.D)
 Original location:
France

10. Edgar Degas
 Title: The Rehearsal on Stage
 Artist / Patron: Edgar Degas
 Date: c. 1874 A.D (19th
century A.D) Original location: France
 Material: Pastel over brush-and-ink drawing on wove paper, laid on bristol
board, mounted on canvas

11. Post-Impressionism
 More visual elements that reflect the personalities
of corresponding artists
 A milestone towards the emergence of
Expressionism
 A trust to subconscious mind while rendering the
perceptions on colours and compositions
 Either “Pointillism” or vibrant brushstrokes were
applied

12. George Seurat
 Title: A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte
 Artist / Patron: Georges Seurat
 Date: 1884 – 1886 A.D (19th century A.D)
 Original location: The Art Institute of Chicago

13. Vincent Van Gogh
 Title: The Starry Night
 Artist / Patron: Vincent van Gogh
 Date: 1889 A.D (19th century) Original location: Holland

14. Paul Czanne
 Title: The Large Bathers Artist / Patron: Paul Cézanne
 Date: 1906 A.D (20th
century A.D) Original location: France

15. Common features of
Impressionistic artists
 They discovered that they shared an interest in painting landscape
and contemporary life rather than historical or mythological scenes.
 They often ventured into the countryside together to paint in the
open air, but not for the purpose of making sketches to be developed
into carefully finished works in the studio, as was the usual custom.
 By painting in sunlight directly from nature, and making bold use of
the vivid synthetic pigments that had become available since the
beginning of the century, they began to develop a lighter and
brighter manner of painting that extended further the Realism of
Gustave Courbet and the Barbizon school.
(adopted from Wikipedia)

16.  Claude Monet, Jardin à Sainte-Adresse, 1867,
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (a work
showing the influence of Japanese prints) Thank you