claude monet impression: sunrise 1872 oil on canvas, 48 x 63cm
TRANSCRIPT
Post-Impressionism
• Term coined by the British artist and art critic Roger Fry in 1910 to describe the development of French art after Impressionism
• The term was used when Fry organized the 1910 exhibition -- Manet and Post-Impressionism
Post-Impressionism
• Created works during the 1880s in Paris, France
• 4 Key Post-Impressionists:
– Paul Cezanne– Paul Gauguin– Vincent Van Gogh– Georges Seurat
The Post-Impressionists
• Started off painting in the Impressionist style but later developed their own highly personal style.
• The Post-Impressionists rejected the Impressionists aim of capturing fleeting moments in favour of more ambitious expression.
POST-IMPRESSIONISM Move beyond the visual/perceptual experience.
- Van Gogh & Gauguin~ Emphasis on feelings/emotions
- Cezanne & Seurat~ Emphasis on form (3D
volume) & structure
Pablo Picasso
Still Life with a Bottle of Rum
1911
The experiments by Cezanne paved the foundation for the works of Picasso.
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
- Captured the timeless beauty of Mont St. Victoire
- Best remembered for his still-lifes and landscape paintings.
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Beginnings / Early works:
- Thickly painted
~ Paint was laid on with unskillful vigour with a palette knife
~ Crude appearance with heavy impasto & dark colour
- Dominant use of dark colours
~ Black, white, tans, greys, occasion touches of brilliant colour
~ Strong contrasts of black & white.
Early Works
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• 1870 - 71:
- Preoccupied with landscape painting
Landscape1870 -71
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• 1872 -- First encounters with Impressionism:
- Under the influence of Camille Pissarro:
~ Started painting outdoors
~ Stopped using palette knife
~ Juxtaposed bright colours & avoided black
~ Created a complex mosaic of delicately balanced touches of colour
Camille Pissarro
The Orchard
1872
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
House of the Hanged Man
1873
- Blocks of form solidly defined and kept in balance by arrangement of horizontals, verticals & diagonals
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Lessons Cezanne learnt from Impressionism:
- Use of brushstrokes as a constructive tool to model volume
- Interplay of colours
* Evolved to study the relationship between colours, tones & forms
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Reactions to Impressionism:
• Searched for underlying structure instead of mere depiction of light and outward surfaces
• Avoided depictions of modern life; painted landscapes and still life of more classical conception
• Looked for inspiration from Old Masters, such as Poussin
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
Mt St. Victoire with the Great Pine
1885 - 87
- Mountain = An integral part of the landscape.
- Landscape is framed by the trunk & branches of the pine tree
- Removed any distractions of the painting
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
Mt St Victoire
1885 - 87
- Modelled volumes & thrust them out into space as though he was chiselling them from rock.
* Retained the volume of objects & the firmly constructed space which he admired in the art of the past.
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Mt St. Victoire:
- Built up pictorial structure by the schematic overlay of colours applied in short, square strokes of the brush
- Worked at creating a permanence in the sense of timelessness that also embraces solidity & flux, order & flexibility
- Aimed to take the contemporary aspects out of his subject and make them appear permanent and eternal
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Development of Cezanne’s brushwork:
Characteristic Style: Method of fine, long parallel strokes, applied in layer upon layer of transparent colour
- Developed his characteristic colour patches through range of colour and direction of brushwork
- Represented the rich diversity of planes and movements in space without losing any brilliance of colour & its reflection
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
•1880s - 1890s: Portraits & Figures
- Impersonal / detachment from the sitter“To make a universal kind of painting, painting in which form itself is the real subject.”
- Worked & reworked, structured & restructured his pictures laboriously.
~ Right balance of form and colour
- Lacked life-like spontaneity but make up for this lack in their exquisite sense of order and harmony.
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Still-Lifes:
- Ideal subject for working slowly
- Fruits = Products of nature; Jars = Sense of craftsmanship
- Focus on shapes of objects & interference of their presence to one another
~ Fruits lost sensual appearance
~ Instead they are arranged in order of occurrence of size & colours in specific sense of order & spatial relationships
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Bathers:
- Attempt at an idealised unity between man and nature in the tradition of Old Masters
- Painted in the studio
- Figures were based on studies of models / sculptures copied in the Louvre
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
The Large Bathers
- Female bathers form triangular groups framed by inward slanting trees, which suggest a compact design
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
- Painted landscapes / still-lifes of more classical conceptions
- Search for fundamental truths & inherent structure in nature
~ Led to unprecedented degree of abstraction
- Tight & complex compositions
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
Purpose of colour:
-For structural purposes
- e.g.
~ perspective, light / shade, depth / distance, shape / solidity
POST-IMPRESSIONISM
PAUL CEZANNE
1839 - 1906
• Way of working:
-Intense observation over a long period of time
- Explored properties of lines, planes, colours & their inter-relationships
~ e.g.
- Effect of linear direction; capacity of planes to create sensation of depth; intrinsic qualities of colour; power of colour to modify the direction and depth of lines & planes