Impressionism and Surrealism: artistic movements and characteristics

Impressionism and Surrealism

Impressionism

Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s (Rewald, 1973, p. 6). The name of the style itself is derived from the title of a Clajude Monet work, Impression, soleil levant (Impression, Sunrise), which provoked the critic Louis Leroy to coin the term in a review in a Parisian newspaper (Rewald, 1973, p.7).

There are several facets of impressionist painting that align its works together. Artists tended to use short, thick brush strokes which were thought to capture the essence of a subject rather than the details. Colors were often applied side-by-side with little mixing, which created a vibrant surface that created an optical combining of colors that was perceived by the viewer's eyes in standing at a distance. Additionally, impressionists tend to favor the inclusion of unusual angles within their works in order to provoke different visual perceptions and thoughts of the on-looker. Most notably, is Impressionists' use of light within their works. New techniques were utilized in order to capture the changing features of the sun and twilight, which can be seen in noting the reflection of colors from object to object within many Impressionist works.

In viewing contemporary art, Impressionism may seem quite tame in terms of technique and subject matter, but the fact remains that the Impressionists were considered radicals in their time. Painters such as Monet, Manet, and Renior and Cezanne began to violate the rules of academic painting in favor of utilizing the aforementioned techniques and skills in order offer onlookers the chance to view realistic scenes of modern life and landscape rather than a staged still-life or portrait staged within the confines of a studio.

Surrealism

Far different from Impressionism is Surrealism, an art style that developed in the early 1920s, which stresses the subconscious or non-rational significance of imagery arrived at by automatism or the exploitation of chance effects, unexpected juxtapositions, etc. (Ades and Gale, 2007, p.15). Largely developed into a movement by individuals who called for the regaining of a rational state of being after the horrors of World Wars I and II, Surrealists sought to use their work as a means to glorify positive expression and nonconformity.

Surrealists utilized techniques that had never before been seen in the art world. Believing in the "innocent eye," a concept that art is truly created in the unconscious eye, Surrealists worked with psychology and fantastic visual techniques, basing their art on their own memories, feelings and dreams (Durozoi, 2004, p.6). Many Surrealists even used hypnotism and drugs to achieve this state of dream-like unconsciousness before diving into their work. Rather than the movement that can be defined by the physical use of mediums and styles, Surrealism and its noted artists like Picasso, Dali, and Miro encompassed not just a physical style of painting but a more-encompassing mindset and belief system of the painters who became rooted in the movement.

Relationship

Impressionism and Surrealism can be most closely linked not through style or technique, but through the revolutionary aspects of each movement in terms of what each brought to the art world. Without the early radicals of Impressionism, the even more widely considered radical movement of Surrealism would lack a basis for inception. In viewing how Surrealism can be viewed as an evolution from Impressionism, the movement itself does not deviate from the basis that its predecessor established so much as it continues it. The basis of both movements was an effort to go against the grain in the art world, or in other words to establish something new and fresh with a refusal to conform.

This type of nonconformity can be seen in viewing some of the most noted works from each movement. Take for example, Edgar Degas' Dancers at the Bar (1888), a noted Impressionist work, and Rene Magritte's noted Surrealist painting, The Son of Man (1964). In viewing Degas' work, one can note the lack of exact lines and structure in the dancers' bodies. Softer strokes and similar colors note the movement and fluidity that Degas is trying to convey. In the context of 1888, such work was revolutionary.