Impressionism: Introduction and Background
Known for its radical departure from traditional aesthetics in painting and the decorative arts, Impressionism was a movement deeply rooted in its ideological, cultural, political, and sociological context. The characteristic visual features of Impressionist painting include experimentation with untraditional colors and styles that signal the early transition towards non-representational forms. Subject matters in Impressionist art changed from depicting officially sanctioned people, places, and symbols towards capturing snapshots of daily life. Beyond its core aesthetics, which do vary from artist to artist, Impressionism also highlighted changing social hierarchies related to race, class, and gender. Artists no longer worked solely on commission from religious or political patrons but also from a burgeoning bourgeoisie. The diversity within Impressionism also draws attention to the ways the movement manifested differently in different geographic regions, although the movement remained firmly rooted in France, and centered in Paris. From its beginning in the 1870s until its shift towards post-Impressionism around the 1890s, Impressionism encapsulates the artistic zeitgeist of the late nineteenth century. This gallery presents six quintessential Impressionist works of art.
Edouard Manet “Olympia”
Rendered in oil on canvas, Manet’s “Olympia” signifies many of the most striking features that characterize Impressionism. As Gilman (1985) points out, “Olympia” deconstructs and confronts social hierarchies and realities by depicting a bold female courtesan waited on by her black servant. Therefore, Manet could be inadvertently commenting on white privilege as well as on female sexuality. The subject represents the modern “defiant heroine,” signalling the birth of the feminist movement (Flescher, 1985). Depicting the female nude was nothing new in the nineteenth century, but rendering her in a way that is neither idealized nor fully denigrated did mark a departure from how women had been depicted in past European paintings. The voyeurism of the “male gaze” is subverted, as the woman in Manet’s painting...
Unlike the portraits that would have been commissioned by the wealthy, Manet’s “Olympia” is a depiction of a woman taking pleasure in her power, which could have been considered a threat to the prevailing social order.
Berthe Morisot “The Cradle”
Berthe Morisot’s “The Cradle” depicts a snapshot of female life in late nineteenth-century France that is totally different from the one Manet provides in “Olympia.” Rendered in oil on canvas, “The Cradle,” depicts a woman gazing upon her child. As Jacobus (1995) points out, not only is the theme of motherhood salient in Morisot’s work, but also the motif of mirroring and gazing. Interestingly, mirroring and gazing are also themes in Manet’s “Olympia,” as the subject in the latter painting holds a hand-held mirror while gazing directly at the viewer. In “The Cradle,” the mirroring is implied in the way the mother sees herself in her own child. The mother does not engage the viewer at all; it is as if the viewer peeks at her from behind a door, catching a glimpse of what maternal life, maternal instincts, and maternal feelings must be like. It is also important to point out that like Manet and the other Impressionists, Morisot captures the life of the bourgeois woman and not of the working class. The way the light is rendered, and Morisot’s brushwork are also categorically Impressionistic.
Mary Cassatt “The Child’s Bath”
To underscore the fact that not all Impressionist artists were from France, American artist Mary Cassatt’s painting “The Child’s Bath” is included in this gallery. Moreover, Cassatt’s oil on canvas painting bears thematic resemblance to Berthe Morisot’s “The Cradle,” showing a mother and child. In “The Child’s Bath,” the mother lovingly holds her child and washes her feet in a basin. The scene is strikingly simple and relatively mundane, showing ordinary life. Stylistically, the rich colors and the lack of attention to realism…
