Boulevard Montmartre, Mardi Gras (Paris, 1897) by Camille Pissarro currently resides in the permanent exhibition at the Armand Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, California. This work is part of a series of fourteen paintings depicting different times of the day and seasons of the Boulevard Montmartre in Paris. Camille Pissarro is known as the "Father of Impression" for his "teacher's eye" of drawing what he saw in front of him.[1]
Pissarro first sketched this idea, before using oil on canvas to paint from his balcony window of the Grand Hôtel de Russie overlooking the grand boulevard.[2] He depicts a nineteenth century Mardi Gras procession, also known as the Carnaval de Paris from the streets below extending its grandeur far into the distance. The Carnaval de Paris also included a parade before the masked ball at the Paris Opera House.[3] This street scene focuses on the idea of a "New Paris" that reveals an outdoor natural setting of beauty without adulteration in order to educate the public of real ideas. This painting marks one of Pissarro's last major works due to his weakening eyesight commonly associated with his elderly age. Many critics believe that this disability formed his appearance of unclear, spontaneous, artistic freedom.[4]
Technique
Pissarro's inspiration and artistic style was constantly evolving from the different environments he placed himself within.[5] He studied at the Académie Suisse where he was introduced to two of the most influential people in his life: Claude Monet and Paul Cézanne.[6] He moved around often in search of new inspiration and direction for his work. It was not until he returned to Paris and directed his attention from country landscapes to urban cities that emphasized the importance of order, proportion, and structure.[7] His work depicts dynamic movement through his lack of attention to fine details, less individually drawn figures, and an increase of broad subjects portraying real life. His brushstrokes consists of short, loose, semi-thick strokes to enhance the idea of motion running through his work. At first glance, the work comes off as blurry and poorly painted until the viewer gazes at the painting and sees the qualities of details he positions through his stylistic brushstrokes. The clumps of men in black top coats and suits are significant to traditional ninetieth century dress and the men on horses signify the police patrolling the street parade.[8] The trees in front of the building are intricately stylized for the viewer to believe there are streamers flying through the winding trees. Pissarro designs the French Baroque architecture of the building as a static subject by its clarity and attention to detail of traditional French architecture.
Pointillism Influence
This work has an influence of Pointillism which Pissarro tested as an emerging "scientific" theory of art before creating this work. However, he was not very talented in this style and shortly after absorbed the Neo-Impressionism style with a strong emphasis of an abnormal amount of brush strokes and overlapping details. Unlike most of the other paintings from the Boulevard Montmartre series, the lower half of this particular work references similar characteristics to pointillism by clustering primary colors throughout the painting.[9] However, once seen in person, one can automatically notice the extent of blending the colors together instead of separate dots. Many also believe that his study of the Japanese art nouveau style instilled a sense of distance to the street's progression, which can be seen from the foreground's progress of linear perspective.[10]
Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro was a Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter born on the island of St Thomas. His importance resides in his contributions to both Impressionism and Post-Impressionism. Pissarro studied from great forerunners, including Gustave Courbet and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. He later studied and worked alongside Georges Seurat and Paul Signac when he took on the Neo-Impressionist style at the age of 54.
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities, ordinary subject matter, unusual visual angles, and inclusion of movement as a crucial element of human perception and experience. Impressionism originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s.
Post-Impressionism was a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 and 1905, from the last Impressionist exhibition to the birth of Fauvism. Post-Impressionism emerged as a reaction against Impressionists' concern for the naturalistic depiction of light and colour. Its broad emphasis on abstract qualities or symbolic content means Post-Impressionism encompasses Les Nabis, Neo-Impressionism, Symbolism, Cloisonnism, the Pont-Aven School, and Synthetism, along with some later Impressionists' work. The movement's principal artists were Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh and Georges Seurat.
Pointillism is a technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are applied in patterns to form an image.
Paul Victor Jules Signac was a French Neo-Impressionist painter who, with Georges Seurat, helped develop the artistic technique Pointillism.
Neo-Impressionism is a term coined by French art critic Félix Fénéon in 1886 to describe an art movement founded by Georges Seurat. Seurat's most renowned masterpiece, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, marked the beginning of this movement when it first made its appearance at an exhibition of the Société des Artistes Indépendants in Paris. Around this time, the peak of France's modern era emerged and many painters were in search of new methods. Followers of Neo-Impressionism, in particular, were drawn to modern urban scenes as well as landscapes and seashores. Science-based interpretation of lines and colors influenced Neo-Impressionists' characterization of their own contemporary art. The Pointillist and Divisionist techniques are often mentioned in this context, because they were the dominant techniques in the beginning of the Neo-Impressionist movement.
Divisionism, also called chromoluminarism, is the characteristic style in Neo-Impressionist painting defined by the separation of colors into individual dots or patches that interact optically.
Le Moulin de la Galette is the title of several paintings made by Vincent van Gogh in 1886 of a windmill, the Moulin de la Galette, which was near Van Gogh and his brother Theo's apartment in Montmartre. The owners of the windmill maximized the view on the butte overlooking Paris, creating a terrace for viewing and a dance hall for entertainment.
Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, Rainy Weather is an 1896 painting by Camille Pissarro in the collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario.
Asnières, now named Asnières-sur-Seine, is the subject and location of paintings that Vincent van Gogh made in 1887. The works, which include parks, restaurants, riverside settings and factories, mark a breakthrough in van Gogh's artistic development. In the Netherlands his work was shaped by great Dutch masters as well as Anton Mauve a Dutch realist painter who was a leading member of the Hague School and a significant early influence on his cousin-in-law van Gogh. In Paris van Gogh was exposed to and influenced by Impressionism, Symbolism, Pointillism, and Japanese woodblock print genres.
The Montmartre paintings are a group of works that Vincent van Gogh created in 1886 and 1887 of the Paris district of Montmartre while living there, at 54 Rue Lepic, with his brother Theo. Rather than capture urban settings in Paris, van Gogh preferred pastoral scenes, such as Montmartre and Asnières in the northwest suburbs. Of the two years in Paris, the work from 1886 often has the dark, somber tones of his early works from the Netherlands and Brussels. By the spring of 1887, van Gogh embraced use of color and light and created his own brushstroke techniques based upon Impressionism and Pointillism. The works in the series provide examples of his work during that period of time and the progression he made as an artist.
Seine (paintings) is the subject and location of paintings that Vincent van Gogh made in 1887. The Seine has been an integral part of Parisian life for centuries for commerce, travel and entertainment. Here van Gogh primarily captures the respite and relief from city life found in nature.
Still life paintings by Vincent van Gogh (Paris) is the subject of many drawings, sketches and paintings by Vincent van Gogh in 1886 and 1887 after he moved to Montmartre in Paris from the Netherlands. While in Paris, Van Gogh transformed the subjects, color and techniques that he used in creating still life paintings.
Boulevard des Capucines is an oil on canvas street scene painting of the famous Paris boulevard by French Impressionist artist Claude Monet created in 1873.
The House of the Deaf Woman and the Belfry at Eragny is an 1886 oil painting by French artist Camille Pissarro, located in the Indianapolis Museum of Art, which is in Indianapolis, Indiana. It is a view of Pissarro's neighbor's yard in Eragny, created during his brief period of experimentation with pointillism.
Le Boulevard de Montmartre, Matinée de Printemps is a painting of Paris' Boulevard Montmartre by Camille Pissarro.
Victor Alfred Paul Vignon was a French Impressionist landscape painter and graphic artist. He was involved with the impressionism movement and its protagonists, as he exhibited at the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eight Paris Impressionist Exhibitions from 1880 to 1886.
Imperial Fritillaries in a Copper Vase is an oil painting on canvas created by the post-impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh in Paris, 1887. The painting is now part of the collection of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, France. This work was made at a time of the life of Van Gogh when he first encountered influences from Impressionists and became aware of light and color, implementing it in his paintings. This painting presages some of his most famous subsequent works, and stands out from other still lifes because of the implementation of mixed techniques and complementary colors.
Louis Hayet was a French Post-Impressionist painter.
The Batignolles group was a group of young avant-garde painters from the end of the 19th century who gathered around Édouard Manet. The group bears its name in reference to the Batignolles district, where the artists used to meet between 1869 and 1875. Many of the artists in the group later became known for the Impressionism movement.
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