Yana Fenech

Impressionism

Impressionism is a French 19th century art movement. Impressionist artist capture the image of an object as if someone only managed to catch a quick glimpse of the subject or item. The key components in this technique or style are:

* Light

* Colour theory

* Technique

* Subject matter

When selecting and using colours the artists use complementary primary, secondary and tertiary on canvas to achieve colours that are found in nature. All of the artists in this era have their own style, most of the art revolved around light, wispy, short and small brush strokes on the canvas itself. Impressionist artists were the first to paint still lives. They also commonly illustrated women, children, everyday people, many opera scenes and various other subjects.

Famous French Impressionist Artists

Claude Monet

One of the many famous French impressionist was Claude Monet. Claude Monet was the founder and leader of the impressionist group, this group of artists borrowed their name from one of Monet’s Paintings; Impression Sunrise. Three of Monet’s favourite subjects to depict in his many paintings were seascapes, middle class people of the respective century and various outdoor scenes.

Eduard Manet and Berthe Morisot

Two other famous French impressionist artist were; Edouard Manet and Berthe Morisot. These were close friends and both were very keen artists. The pair were very much in-touch with the art scene of their century and knew many of the artists who are now regarded as the French impressionists of the 19th century. These two, together with the other impressionist artists they knew, went on to be the trend setters of Impressionism. Manet and Morisot frequently met with the various impressionist artists and encouraged them to exhibit their work.

In actual fact Edouard Manet was only an artistic influence of and befriended most of the Impressionists. He himself was not an actual Impressionist. He refused to be labelled as an impressionist and did not exhibit his art with other impressionists. However many Impressionists borrowed from his style very closely. Manet was trained in the usual academic manner but broke away from traditional styles; he brought a change in art. At the time Japanese art began to influence Europe. Manet was inspired by Japan’s art forms and lots of Japanese prints. Manet was also very famous for painting the same thing in different shades of light, on many occasions he would do some shading before starting a being piece. Manet’s close friend, Berth Min different shades of light. Morisot was one of the first women to join the group of French Impressionist painters.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir

As a painter he is mostly known for his portrait paintings, group portraits, landscapes and great depiction of textures of skins in portraits of people.

Edgar Degas

Degas is known as the master of drawing human figures in motion. He especially liked to illustrate Ballet performances.

Normally the paintings were small because the artist usually finished the piece on the spot where they sketched due to the fact that they were depicting still life. Sometimes impressionist art was criticised meaning less paintings. The development of photography also influenced many impressionists. Impressionism was a very influential art form; it very much changed the way we think about art, view it and create it. Impressionism inspired many people and artists from other art movements; one can say that it has changed the perspective of art itself.

Claude Monet