Artistic principles of impressionism. The concept of impressionism and the history of occurrence How the direction in impressionist painting is translated

"Exhibition of the Impressionists", based on the name of the painting by Claude Monet "Impression. Rising sun" (fr. Impression, soleil levant). Initially, this term was somewhat disparaging, indicating a corresponding attitude towards artists who wrote in a new "careless" manner.

Impressionism in painting

origins

By the mid-1880s, impressionism gradually ceased to exist as a single direction, and disintegrated, giving a noticeable impetus to the evolution of art. By the beginning of the 20th century, the trend away from realism gained momentum, and a new generation of artists turned away from impressionism.

The emergence of the name

Decades have passed. And a new generation of artists will come to a real collapse of forms and impoverishment of content. Then both the critics and the public saw in the condemned Impressionists - realists, and a little later, the classics of French art.

The specificity of the philosophy of impressionism

French impressionism did not raise philosophical problems and did not even try to penetrate the colored surface of everyday life. Instead, Impressionism, being art to a certain extent campy and mannerist, focuses on superficiality, the fluidity of a moment, mood, lighting, or angle of view.

Like the art of the Renaissance (Renaissance), impressionism is built on the features and skills of perceiving perspective. At the same time, the Renaissance vision explodes with the proven subjectivity and relativity of human perception, which makes color and form autonomous components of the image. For impressionism, it is not so important what is shown in the figure, but how it is shown is important.

Impressionist paintings do not carry social criticism, do not touch upon social problems such as hunger, illness, death, presenting only the positive aspects of life. This later led to a split among the Impressionists themselves.

Impressionism and society

Impressionism is characterized by democracy. By inertia, art in the 19th century was considered a monopoly of aristocrats, the upper strata of the population. It was they who acted as the main customers for murals, monuments, it was they who were the main buyers of paintings and sculptures. Plots with the hard work of the peasants, the tragic pages of our time, the shameful aspects of wars, poverty, social turmoil were condemned, not approved, not bought. Criticism of the blasphemous morality of society in the paintings of Theodore Gericault, Francois Millet found a response only from supporters of artists and a few experts.

The Impressionists in this matter occupied quite compromise, intermediate positions. Biblical, literary, mythological, historical plots inherent in official academicism were discarded. On the other hand, they ardently desired recognition, respect, even awards. Indicative is the activity of Edouard Manet, who for years sought recognition and awards from the official Salon and its administration.

Instead, a vision of everyday life and modernity appeared. Artists often painted people in motion, during fun or relaxation, imagined the view of a certain place in a certain light, nature was also the motive of their work. They took subjects of flirting, dancing, staying in cafes and theaters, boat trips, on beaches and in gardens. Judging by the paintings of the Impressionists, life is a series of small holidays, parties, pleasant pastimes outside the city or in a friendly environment (a number of paintings by Renoir, Manet and Claude Monet). The Impressionists were among the first to paint in the air, without finalizing their work in the studio.

Technique

The new trend differed from academic painting both technically and ideologically. First of all, the Impressionists abandoned the contour, replacing it with small separate and contrasting strokes, which they applied in accordance with the color theories of Chevreul, Helmholtz and Rude. The sunbeam splits into its components: violet, blue, blue, green, yellow, orange, red, but since blue is a variety of blue, their number is reduced to six. Two colors placed side by side reinforce each other and, conversely, when mixed, they lose their intensity. In addition, all colors are divided into primary, or primary, and dual, or derivatives, with each dual paint being additional in relation to the first:

• Blue - Orange
• Red Green
• Yellow - Purple

Thus, it became possible not to mix paints on the palette and to obtain the desired color by correctly applying them to the canvas. This later became the reason for the rejection of black.

Then the Impressionists stopped concentrating all their work on canvases in the studios, now they prefer open air, where it is more convenient to grab a fleeting impression of what they saw, which was made possible thanks to the invention of steel paint tubes, which, unlike leather bags, could be closed so that the paint did not dry out.

Also, the artists used opaque paints, which do not transmit light well and are unsuitable for mixing because they quickly turn gray, which allowed them to create paintings not with " internal", a " external» light reflecting off the surface.

Technical differences contributed to the achievement of other goals, first of all, the Impressionists tried to capture a fleeting impression, the smallest changes in each subject depending on the lighting and time of day, the highest embodiment was Monet's cycles of paintings "Haystacks", "Rouen Cathedral" and "London's Parliament".

In general, many masters worked in the Impressionist style, but the basis of the movement were Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, Frédéric Bazille and Berthe Morisot. However, Manet always called himself an "independent artist" and never participated in exhibitions, and although Degas participated, he never painted his works en plein air.

Timeline by artist

Impressionists

Exhibitions

• First exhibition(April 15 - May 15)

• Second exhibition(April )

Address: st. Lepeletier, 11 (Durand-Ruel Gallery). Members: Basile (posthumously, the artist died in 1870), Beliard, Bureau, Debutin, Degas, Caillebotte, Cals, Lever, Legros, Lepic, Millet, Monet, Morisot, L. Otten, Pissarro, Renoir, Rouar, Sisley, Tillo, Francois

• Third exhibition(April )

Address: st. Lepelletier, 6. Members: Guillaumin, Degas, Caillebotte, Cals, Cordeil, Lever, Lamy, Monet, Morisot, Alphonse Moreau, Piette, Pissarro, Renoir, Rouard, Cezanne, Sisley, Tillo, Francois.

• Fourth Exhibition(April 10 - May 11)

Address: Opera Avenue, 28. Members: Bracquemont, Madame Bracquemont, Gauguin, Degas, Zandomeneghi, Caillebotte, Cals, Cassatt, Lebourg, Monet, Piette, Pissarro, Rouart, Somm, Tillo, Forain.

• Fifth exhibition(April 1 - April 30)

Address: st. Pyramids, 10. Members: Brakemont, Mrs. Brakemont, Vidal, Vignon, Guillaumin, Gauguin, Degas, Zandomeneghi, Caillebotte, Cassatt, Lebourg, Lever, Morisot, Pissarro, Raffaelli, Rouart, Tillo, Forain.

• Sixth exhibition(April 2 - May 1)

Address: Boulevard des Capucines, 35 (studio of the photographer Nadar). Members: Vidal, Vignon, Guillaume, Gauguin, Degas, Zandomeneghi, Cassatt, Morisot, Pissarro, Raffaelli, Rouar, Tillo, Forain.

• Seventh exhibition(March )

Address: Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, 251 (At Durand-Ruel). Members: Vignon, Guillaume, Gauguin, Caillebotte, Monet, Morisot, Pissarro, Renoir, Sisley.

• Eighth Exhibition(May 15 - June 15)

Address: st. Laffitt, 1. Members: Madame Braquemont, Vignon, Guillaumin, Gauguin, Degas, Zandomeneghi, Cassette, Morisot, Camille Pissarro, Lucien Pissarro, Redon, Rouard, Seurat, Signac, Tillo, Forain, Schuffenecker.

Impressionism in literature

In literature, impressionism did not develop as a separate trend, but its features were reflected in naturalism and symbolism.

First of all, it is characterized by the expression of the author’s private impression, the rejection of an objective picture of reality, the depiction of every moment, which should have entailed the absence of a plot, history and the replacement of thought with perception, and reason with instinct. The main features of the impressionist style were formulated by the Goncourt brothers in their work "Diary", where the famous phrase " Seeing, feeling, expressing - this is all art has become a central position for many writers.

In naturalism, the main principle was truthfulness, fidelity to nature, but it is subject to impression, and therefore the appearance of reality depends on each individual and her temperament. This is most fully expressed in the novels of Emile Zola, his detailed descriptions of smells, sounds and visual perceptions.

Symbolism, on the contrary, demanded a rejection of the material world and a return to the ideal, but the transition is possible only through fleeting impressions, revealing a secret essence in visible things. A striking example of poetic impressionism - a collection

IMPRESSIONISM(French impressionnisme, from impression - impression) - a trend in art of the late 1860s - early 1880s, the main purpose of which was to convey fleeting, changeable impressions. Impressionism was based on the latest discoveries in optics and color theory; in this he is in tune with the spirit of scientific analysis characteristic of the late 19th century. Impressionism manifested itself most clearly in painting, where special attention was paid to the transfer of color and light.

Impressionism appeared in France in the late 1860s. Its leading representatives are Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Berthe Morisot, Alfred Sisley and Jean Frederic Bazille. Edouard Manet and Edgar Degas exhibited their paintings with them, although the style of their works cannot be called impressionistic. The word "Impressionism" comes from the name of Monet's painting. Impression. Rising Sun(1872, Paris, Marmottan Museum), presented at the exhibition in 1874. The name implied that the artist conveys only his fleeting impression of the landscape. Now the term "impressionism" is understood more than just the subjective vision of the artist: as a careful study of nature, primarily in terms of color and lighting. Such a concept is essentially the opposite of the traditional understanding, dating back to the Renaissance, of the main task of painting as the transfer of the form of objects. The goal of the Impressionists was to depict instantaneous, as it were, “random” situations and movements. This was facilitated by the asymmetry, fragmentation of compositions, the use of complex angles and cuts of figures. The picture becomes a separate frame, a fragment of the moving world.

Landscapes and scenes from urban life - perhaps the most characteristic genres of impressionistic painting - were painted "en plein air", i.e. directly from life, and not on the basis of sketches and preparatory sketches. The Impressionists peered intently at nature, noticing colors and shades that are usually invisible, such as blue in the shadows. Their artistic method was to decompose complex tones into their constituent pure colors of the spectrum. Colored shadows and pure light quivering painting were obtained. The Impressionists applied paint in separate strokes, sometimes using contrasting tones in one area of ​​the picture, the size of the strokes varied. Sometimes, for example, to depict a clear sky, they were smoothed out with a brush into a more even surface (but even in this case, a free, careless painting style was emphasized). The main feature of Impressionist paintings is the effect of lively flickering of colors.

Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley and Claude Monet in their work preferred landscapes and urban scenes. Auguste Renoir painted people in the bosom of nature or in the interior. His work perfectly illustrates the tendency characteristic of impressionism to blur the lines between genres. Pictures like Ball at the Moulin de la Galette(Paris, Museum D "Orsay) or Rowers breakfast(1881, Washington, Phillips Gallery), are colorful memories of the joys of life, urban or rural.

Similar searches for the transmission of the light-air environment, the decomposition of complex tones into pure colors of the solar spectrum took place not only in France. The Impressionists include James Whistler (England and the USA), Max Lieberman, Lovis Corinth (Germany), Joaquin Sorolla (Spain), K.A. Korovin, I.E. Grabar (Russia).

Impressionism in sculpture implies a lively free modeling of fluid soft forms that creates a complex play of light on the surface of the material and a sense of incompleteness. In the poses, the moment of movement, development is accurately captured; the figures seem to have been taken with a hidden camera, as, for example, in some works by E. Degas and O. Rodin (France), Medardo Rosso (Italy), P.P. Trubetskoy (Russia).

At the beginning of the 20th century in painting, new trends were outlined, expressed in the rejection of realism and the appeal to abstraction; they caused younger artists to turn away from Impressionism. However, Impressionism left a rich legacy: primarily an interest in color issues, as well as an example of a bold break with tradition.

Impressionism(French impressionnisme, from impression - impression) - a trend in art of the last third of the 19th - early 20th centuries, which originated in France and then spread throughout the world, whose representatives sought to most naturally capture the real world in its mobility and variability, to convey their fleeting impressions .

1. Liberation from the traditions of realism (no mythological, biblical and historical paintings, only modern life).

2. Observation and study of the surrounding reality. Not what he sees, but how he sees from the position of the perceived "visual essence of things"

3. Daily life of a modern city. Psychology of the city dweller. The dynamics of life. The pace, the rhythm of life.

4. "Effect of a stretched moment"

5. Search for new forms. Small sizes of works (etudes, framing). Not typical, but random.

6. Serialization of paintings (Monet's "Hacks")

7. The novelty of the painting system. Open pure color. Relief, the richest collection of reflexes, quivering.

8. Mixing genres.

Edouard Manet - innovator. From deaf dense tones to light painting. Fragmentation of compositions.

"Olympia"- relies on Titian, Giorgione, Goya. Posed by Victoria Muran. Venus is depicted as a modern cocotte. At the feet of a black cat. A black woman presents a bouquet. The background is a dark, warm tone of the woman's body like a pearl on blue sheets. The volume is broken. There is no black and white modeling.

"Breakfast on the Grass"- model and two artists + landscape + still life. Black frock coats form a contrast with the naked body.

"Flutist"- the impression of the music.

"Bar Folies-Bergere" - the girl is a bartender. The thrill of a peeped moment. The loneliness of a bustling city. The illusion of happiness. I put it in the whole canvas (inaccessible in my thoughts, but accessible to bar customers). A full hall of visitors is an image of the world.

Claude Monet - abandoned the traditional sequence (undercoating, glazing, etc.) - ala prima

"Impression. Rising Sun" - Fieria yellow, orange, green. The boat is a visual accent. Elusive, unfinished landscape, no contours. Variability of the light-air environment. Rays of light change vision.

"Breakfast on the Grass" - edge of the forest, picnic experience , dark green gamma interspersed with brown and black. The leaves are wet. The woman's clothes and the tablecloth are illuminated, filled with air, light through the foliage.

Boulevard des Capucines in Paris fragmentary. Cuts off two people who are looking at the boulevard from the balcony. The crowd of people is the life of the city. Half in light from the setting sun and half in shadow from the building. No visual center, instant impression.

"Rocks in Belle-Ile"- the moving mass of water dominates (thick strokes). Iridescent shades vigorously applied. Rocks are reflected in the water, and water is reflected in the rocks. Feeling the power of the elements, boiling green-blue water. High horizon composition.

"Gare Saint-Lazare" - the interior of the station is shown, but the steam locomotive and the steam that is everywhere are more interesting (fascination with fog, lilac haze).

Pierre Auguste Renoir- an artist of joy, known primarily as a master of a secular portrait, not devoid of sentimentality.

"Swing"- imbued with warm colors, youth is shown, the girl is impressed.

"Ball at the Moulin de la Gallette" - genre scene. Day. Young people, students, shop assistants, etc. At tables under acacia trees, a dance floor. Light overflows (solar bunnies on the backs).

"Portrait of Jeanne Samary" - flower women. Charming, feminine, graceful, touching, direct actress. Deep eyes, a slight sunny smile.

"Portrait of Madame Charpentier with children"- an elegant secular woman in a black dress with a train and two girls in blue. Tapestry table, dog, parquet - everything speaks of the wealth of the family.

Edgar Degas- did not write in the open air, the cult of line and drawing. Compositions diagonally (from bottom to top)); S-shaped, spiral shapes + a window from which lighting + lighting from spotlights. Oil, then bed.

"Ballet Girls", "Dancers"- invades the lives of ballerinas. Strokes connect drawing and painting. Constant pace of training.

"Blue Dancers"- no individuality - a single wreath of bodies. In one corner there is still light from the ramps, and in the other the shadow of the wings. The moment is still actresses and ordinary people. Expressive silhouettes, cornflower blue dresses. Fragmentation - the characters do not look at the viewer.

"Apsent" - man and woman are sitting in a cafe. Ash gamma. A man with a pipe looks in one direction, and a drunken woman with a detached look - aching loneliness.

Camille Pissarro - fond of landscapes, including people, carts in them. The motive of the road with walking. Loved spring and autumn.

"Entrance to the village of Voisin» - a dim, soft landscape, trees along the road - frame the entrance, their branches mix, dissolving in the sky. Slowly, calmly, the horse walks. Houses are not just architectural objects, but dwellings for people (warm nests).

"Opera Passage in Paris"(series) - a gray cloudy day. The roofs are slightly powdered with snow, the pavement is wet, the buildings are drowning in a veil of snow, passers-by with umbrellas turn into shadows. The color of humid air envelops. Lilac-blue, olive tones. Small strokes.

Alfred Sisley- sought to notice the beauty of nature, the epic tranquility inherent in the rural landscape.

"Frost in Louveciennes" - morning, fresh state, objects are bathed in light (fusion). No shadows (fine nuances), yellow-orange colors. Quiet corner, not a hurried city. The feeling of purity, fragility, love for this place

Impressionism in Russia. develops at a later time and at an accelerated pace than in France

V.A.Serov - indifferent to academic drawing wants to show the beauty of nature in color.

"Girl with peaches"- a portrait of Verochka Mamontova. Everything is natural and unconstrained, every detail is connected with one another. The charm of a girl's face, the poetry of a life image, a light-saturated colorful painting. The charm and freshness of the study, organically combined two trends, two forces that formed a single form of pictorial vision. Everything seems so simple and natural, but there is so much depth and wholeness in this simplicity!! With the utmost expressiveness, V. Serov conveyed the light pouring in a silvery stream from the window and filling the room. The girl is sitting at the table and is not busy with anything, as if she really sat down for a moment, automatically picked up a peach and holds it, looking at you simply and frankly. But this peace is only momentary, and a passion for frisky movement peeps through it.

"Children"- shows the spiritual world of children (sons). The elder is looking at the sunset, and the younger is facing the viewer. A different outlook on life.

"Mika Morozov"- sits in a chair, but rolls down on the viewer. Childish excitement is conveyed.

"Chorus Girl"- etude. He paints with juicy strokes of the brush, wide strokes in the foliage, strokes either vertical or horizontal and different in texture ⇒ dynamism, air and light. The combination of nature and girls, freshness, immediacy.

"Paris. Boulevard des Capucines" - colorful kaleidoscope of colors. Artificial lighting - entertainment, decorative theatricality.

I.E. Grabar - volitional, emotional beginning.

« February azure»- I saw a birch from ground level and was shocked. The chimes of the rainbow are united by the azure of the sky. The birch is monumental (to the whole canvas).

"March Snow"- the girl carries buckets on the yoke, the shadow of the tree on the melted snow.

Impressionism opened a new art - it is important how the artist sees, new forms and ways of presenting. They have a moment, we have a stretch in time; we have less dynamics, more romanticism.

Mane Breakfast on the grass Mane Olympia

Manet "Bar Folies-Bergere" Manet Flutist"

Monet "Impression. Rising Sun Monet "Breakfast on the Grass" - "Boulevard des Capucines in Paris"

Monet "Rocks in Belle-Ile"» Monet Gare Saint-Lazare

Monet Boulevard des Capucines in ParisRenoir"Swing"

Renoir "Ball at the Moulin de la Gallette" Renoir "Portrait of Jeanne Samary"

Renoir "Portrait of Madame Charpentier with Children"

Degas "Blue Dancers" Degas "Apsent"

Pissarro -"Opera Passage in Paris"(series) Pissarro "Entrance to the village of Voisin»

Sisley "Frost in Louveciennes" Serov "Girl with Peaches"

Serov "Children" Serov "Mika Morozov"

Korovin "Chorus Girl" Korovin "Paris. Boulevard of the Capucines»

Grabar "February azure" Grabar "March snow"

Introduction………………………………………………………………...…….3

1 Impressionism, as one of the directions of art of the XIX century………5

1.1 The history of the development of impressionism…………..………………..…….5

1.2 The main characteristic features of impressionism……………...…….7

2 The work of artists - impressionists……..……………...……9

2.1 Edouard Manet………………………………….………………….……9

2.2 Edgar Degas……………………………….…………………….……..11

2.3 Auguste Renoir………………………….……………………….…….13

2.4 Claude Monet……………….…………………………………….……..15

2.5 Alfred Sisley……………………………………………….…….16

2.6 Camille Pissarro………………………………………………………...17

2.7 Paul Cezanne…………………………………………………….……18

3 The cultural value of impressionism……………………………....19

Conclusion………………………………………………………………20

List of used literature……………………………………21

Introduction

In the 19th century, industrial development shortened distances and condensed time. Landscapes have changed and appeared before a person in a new, unusual form for him. The flowering of the landscape was prepared by the whole development of French culture and art. The craving for nature, for everything natural, the desire to oppose the academic trend of feelings simple and unpretentious, was clearly realized even on the eve of the French Revolution. In the early 70s, a group of young artists began to work in France. For the first time in the history of art, artists made it a rule for themselves to paint not in their studio, but in the open air: on the banks of a river, in a field, in a clearing in a forest. These were the future Impressionists. An important principle of Impressionism was the departure from typicality. Transience, a casual look has entered art, it seems that the canvases of the Impressionists were painted by a simple passer-by walking along the boulevards and enjoying life.

Currently, the works of the Impressionists are highly valued. The Impressionist group, as a rule, unites those artists who participated in the exhibitions of the Impressionists in the 1870s and 1880s in Paris. These are Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley and others.

The relevance of the chosen topic is explained by the need to study this area of ​​French art in order to understand the cultural value of impressionism and evaluate its cultural heritage (paintings and canvases that have survived to our time) from a modern point of view.

The purpose of the work is to explore impressionism as one of the trends in French art of the 19th century. In accordance with this, the following tasks were solved:

▬ explore the history of the development of impressionism;

▬ study the work of the main representatives of impressionism;

The object of study of this work is the French art of the XIX century. The subject of the study is impressionism as one of the trends in French art of the 19th century.

The study of the topic - "Impressionism, as one of the directions of French art of the XIX century" was carried out using the following methods:

▬dialectical method - the implementation of a comprehensive knowledge of the object and subject of study of this work;

▬ method of analysis and synthesis - a separate analysis of the constituent parts (creativity, canvases, paintings by prominent artists of this direction);

▬ structural-functional method - determining the role of impressionism in the art of the XIX century and its significance;

▬ systemic method - analysis of French art as a whole and identification of the role and significance of impressionism in it;

▬ analytical method - analysis of the work of several prominent artists of this direction;

▬ a method of summarizing all the knowledge gained on the topic.

The theoretical basis of the presented work was scientific works on cultural studies, affecting the study of the French art of the 19th century, in particular, the work of the Impressionists. These are the works of such authors as Gurevich P.S., Stolyarov D.Yu., Kortunov V.V., Markaryan E.S., Radugin A.A., Schweitzer A., ​​Dmitrieva N.A. and etc.

The set goals and certain tasks determined the structure of the presented work. The work consists of an introduction, main part and conclusion, includes a list of references and applications.

The main part includes three sections: the first section is devoted to the study of the history of the emergence of impressionism, the second section is devoted to the study of the work of the most prominent representatives of this trend, the third section is devoted to the cultural assessment of impressionism.

The work is presented on 21 pages, includes 2 appendices, 13 scientific sources were used to write the work.

1 Impressionism, as one of the directions of art XIX century

1.1 History of the development of impressionism

On the crest of the ideas of the French Revolution, serious changes are taking place in French art. For many artists, the realistic trend ceases to be a standard, and in principle the very realistic vision of the world is denied. Artists are tired of the demands of objectivity and typification. A new, subjective artistic reality is born. Now, what matters is not how everyone sees the world, but how I see it, you see it, he sees it. On this wave, one of the directions of art is formed - impressionism.

In the early 70s. 19th century a group of young artists began to work in France. For the first time in the history of world art, artists made it a rule for themselves to paint not in a studio, but in the open air - on the banks of a river, in a field, in a clearing in a forest. Thanks to the invention of ready-to-carry metal paint tubes, which replaced the old paints prepared by hand from oil and powdered pigments, artists were able to leave their studios to work in the open air. They worked very quickly, because the movement of the sun changed the lighting and color of the landscape. Sometimes they squeezed the paint onto the canvas directly from the tube and got pure sparkling colors with a brushstroke effect. In the 1870s many of these artists were drawn to Paris. These were the future "Impressionists".

A large number of different artists are united by this name and each of them had his own style of drawing. Thus, the Impressionist group unites those artists who participated in Impressionist exhibitions in the 1870s and 1880s. These are Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley, Henri Toulouse-Lautrec and others.

The new painting techniques of young artists, the unusual appearance of the paintings led to the fact that their works were not accepted to the Paris Salon, where the painters had the only opportunity to present their works to the audience. Then they boldly opposed the hostile jury of the Salon, which year after year stubbornly refused to exhibit their works. Together in 1874, they organized their own independent exhibition. The exhibition was opened in the studio of the photographer Nadar, which was located in Paris on the Boulevard des Capuchins. After this exhibition, the artists began to be called Impressionists. This name was born thanks to the critic Louis Leroy. That was the name of the painting by Claude Monet, shown at the exhibition - “Impression. Rising Sun” (“Impression. Levant soleil”).

This word was suitable for their works, because in them the artists conveyed their direct impression of what they saw. Artists approached the image of the world in a new way. The main thing for them was the quivering light, the air, in which the figures of people and objects are, as it were, immersed. In their paintings, one could feel the wind, wet after the rain, the earth warmed by the sun. They sought to discern and show the amazing richness of color in nature. Impressionism was the last major artistic movement in France in the 19th century.

It cannot be said that the path of the Impressionist artists was easy. At first they were not recognized, the press either ignored the artists or mocked them; their painting seemed too bold and unusual, they were laughed at. Nobody wanted to buy their paintings. But they stubbornly went their own way. Neither poverty nor hunger could force them to abandon their beliefs.

The artists did not immediately accept the name "impressionists", which one unfriendly journalist stuck to them. But they resumed the experience of independent exhibitions from 1876. The public began to accept them only at the very end of the 19th century, thanks to the support of art historians and a number of art dealers. Many years passed, some of the Impressionist artists were no longer alive, when, finally, their art was recognized.

So, impressionism is a phenomenon of a new approach to painting, a new look, a thirst to stop a moment of real life, to capture it in a picture for a long time. This direction in art opened the eyes of both artists and viewers to the color and light in nature, turned the routine of academic rules upside down.

1.2 The main characteristic features of impressionism

Now that the heated debate about the meaning and role of Impressionism is a thing of the past, hardly anyone will dare to dispute that the Impressionist movement was a further step in the development of European realistic painting. "Impressionism is, first of all, the art of observing reality, which has reached unprecedented refinement."

Striving for maximum immediacy and accuracy in the transfer of the world around them, they began to paint mainly in the open air and raised the importance of a study from nature, which almost supplanted the traditional type of painting, carefully and slowly created in the studio.

The Impressionists showed the beauty of the real world, in which every moment is unique. Consistently clarifying their palette, the Impressionists freed painting from earthy and brown varnishes and paints. Conditional, "museum" blackness in their canvases gives way to an infinitely varied play of reflexes and colored shadows. They immeasurably expanded the possibilities of fine art, discovering not only the world of sun, light and air, but also the beauty of London fogs, the restless atmosphere of big city life, the scattering of its night lights and the rhythm of incessant movement.

Impressionism is a direction in painting that originated in France in the 1860s and largely determined the development of art in the 19th century. Masters recorded their fleeting impressions, sought to capture the real world in its mobility and variability in the most natural and unbiased way. The central figures of this trend were Cezanne, Degas, Manet, Pizarro, Renoir, and Siley, and the contribution of each of them to its development is unique. The Impressionists opposed the conventions of classicism, romanticism and academism, asserted the beauty of everyday reality, simple, democratic motives, achieved lively authenticity of the image, tried to catch the “impression” of what the eye sees at a particular moment. The most typical theme for the Impressionists is the landscape, but they also touched on many other topics in their work. Degas, for example, depicted races, ballerinas, laundresses, and Renoir depicted charming women and children. In impressionistic outdoor landscapes, a simple, everyday motif is often transformed by an all-pervasive moving light, bringing a sense of festivity to the picture. In some methods of impressionist construction of composition and space, the influence of Japanese engraving and partly photography is noticeable. The Impressionists were the first to create a multifaceted picture of the everyday life of a modern city, capturing the originality of its landscape and the appearance of the people inhabiting it, their way of life, work and entertainment.

Monet Claude Oscar One of the founders of impressionism, in his paintings, the artist Monet, from the second half of the 1860s, sought to convey the variability of the light-air environment, the colorful richness of the world by means of plein-air painting, while maintaining the freshness of the first visual impression of nature. From the name of Monet's landscape “Impression. Rising Sun” (“Impression. Soleil levant”; 1872, Musée Marmottan, Paris) was the name of Impressionism. In his landscape compositions (“Capuchin Boulevard in Paris”, 1873, “Rocks in Etretat”, 1886, both in the Pushkin Museum, Moscow; “Field of Poppies”, 1880s, State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg), Monet recreated the vibration of light and air with the help of small separate strokes of pure color and additional tones of the main spectrum, counting on their optical alignment in the process of visual perception. In an effort to capture the diverse transitional states of nature at different times of the day and in different weather, Monet created in the 1890s a series of paintings-variations on one plot motif (a series of paintings “Rouen Cathedrals”, the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow , and other collections). The late period of Monet's work is characterized by decorativeism, an increasing dissolution of object forms in sophisticated combinations of color spots.

Degas Edgar Starting with strict historical paintings and portraits (The Bellelli Family, circa 1858), in the 1870s Degas became close to the representatives of impressionism, turned to the image of modern urban life - streets, cafes, theatrical performances (Concorde Square, circa 1875; "Absinthe", 1876). In many works, Degas shows the characteristic behavior and appearance of people, generated by the peculiarities of their life, reveals the mechanism of a professional gesture, posture, movement of a person, his plastic beauty (“Ironers”, 1884). In the affirmation of the aesthetic significance of people's lives, their everyday activities, the peculiar humanism of Degas's work is reflected. The art of Degas is inherent in the combination of the beautiful, sometimes fantastic, and the prosaic: conveying the festive spirit of the theater in many ballet scenes (“Star”, pastel, 1878). The artist, as a sober and subtle observer, at the same time captures the tedious everyday work hiding behind the elegant spectacle (“Dance Exam”, pastel, 1880). Degas' works, with their strictly adjusted and at the same time dynamic, often asymmetric composition, precise flexible drawing, unexpected angles, active interaction of figure and space, combine the seeming impartiality and randomness of the motive and architectonics of the picture with careful thoughtfulness and calculation. Late works by Degas are distinguished by the intensity and richness of color, which are complemented by the effects of artificial lighting, enlarged, almost flat forms, and the constraint of space, which gives them a tense and dramatic character (“Blue Dancers”, pastel). Since the late 1880s, Degas has been sculpting a lot, achieving expressiveness in the transfer of instantaneous movement (“Dancer”, bronze).

Renoir Pierre Auguste In 1862-1864, Renoir studied in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, where he became close to his future colleagues in impressionism, Claude Monet and Alfred Sisley. Renoir worked in Paris, visited Algeria, Italy, Spain, Holland, Great Britain, Germany. In the early works of Renoir, the influence of Gustave Courbet and the works of the young Édouard Manet (“Mother Anthony’s Tavern”, 1866,) is felt. At the turn of the 1860s and 1870s, Renoir switched to painting in the open air, organically including human figures in a changeable light and air environment (“Bathing in the Seine”, 1869). Renoir's palette brightens, a light dynamic stroke becomes transparent and vibrating, the coloring is saturated with silver-pearl reflections (“Lodge”, 1874). Depicting episodes snatched from the stream of life, random life situations, Renoir preferred festive scenes of city life - balls, dances, walks, as if trying to embody in them the sensual fullness and joy of being (Moulin de la Galette, 1876). A special place in the work of Renoir is occupied by poetic and charming female images: internally different, but outwardly slightly similar to each other, they seem to be marked by a common seal of the era (“After dinner”, 1879, “Umbrellas”, 1876; portrait of actress Jeanne Samary, 1878) . In the depiction of the nude, Renoir achieves a rare sophistication of carnations, built on a combination of warm flesh tones with gliding light greenish and gray-blue reflexes, giving a smooth and dull surface to the canvas (“Nude Woman Sitting on a Couch”, 1876). A remarkable colorist, Renoir often achieves the impression of monochrome painting with the help of the finest combinations of tones close in color (“Girls in Black”, 1883). From the 1880s, Renoir gravitated more and more towards classical clarity and generalization of forms; features of decorativeness and serene idyllicity are growing in his painting (“Large Bathers”, 1884-1887). Numerous drawings and etchings (“Bathers”, 1895) by Renoir are distinguished by laconicism, lightness and airiness of the stroke.

Manet Edouard A significant influence on the formation of Manet as an artist was exerted by the work of Giorgione, Titian, Hals, Velazquez, Goya, Delacroix. In the works of the late 1850s and early 1860s, which formed a gallery of sharply conveyed human types and characters, Manet combined the lifelike authenticity of the image with the romanticization of the external appearance of the model (“Lola from Valencia”, 1862). Using and rethinking the plots and motifs of the paintings of the old masters, Manet sought to fill them with relevant content, sometimes shockingly introducing the image of a modern person into famous classical compositions (“Breakfast on the Grass”, “Olympia” - both 1863). In the 1860s, Edouard Manet turned to the themes of modern history (“The Execution of Emperor Maximilian”, 1867), but Manet’s penetrating attention to modernity was manifested primarily in scenes that seemed to be snatched from the everyday flow of life, full of lyrical spirituality and inner significance (“ Breakfast in the workshop”, “Balcony” - both 1868), as well as in portraits close to them in terms of artistic installation (portrait of Emile Zola, 1868, portrait of Berthe Morisot, 1872). With his work, Edouard Manet anticipated the emergence, and then became one of the founders of impressionism. At the end of the 1860s, Manet became close to Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, moved from deaf and dense tones, intense color with a predominance of dark colors to light and free plein air painting (“In a Boat”, 1874, Metropolitan Museum of Art; “ In papa Latuille's tavern, 1879). Many of Manet's works are characterized by impressionistic pictorial freedom and fragmentary composition, light-saturated colorful vibrating scale (“Argenteuil”). At the same time, Manet retains the clarity of the drawing, gray and black tones in color, prefers not the landscape, but the everyday plot with a pronounced socio-psychological underpinning (the collision of dreams and reality, the illusory happiness in a sparkling and festive world - in one of Manet's last paintings "Bar at the Folies Bergère", 1881-1882). In the 1870s-1880s, Manet worked a lot in the field of portraiture, expanding the possibilities of this genre and turning it into a kind of study of the inner world of a contemporary (portrait by S. Mallarmé, 1876), painted landscapes and still lifes (“Lilac Bouquet”, 1883), acted as a draftsman, master of etching and lithography.

Pissarro Camille was influenced by John Constable, Camille Corot, Jean Francois Millet. One of the leading masters of impressionism, Pissarro, in numerous rural landscapes, revealed the poetry and charm of the nature of France, with the help of a soft painterly range, a subtle transfer of the state of the light-air environment, gave the charm of freshness to the most unpretentious motives (“Plowed Land”, 1874; “Wheelbarrow”, 1879,) . Subsequently, Pissarro often turned to the urban landscape (“Montmartre Boulevard”, 1897; “Opera Passage in Paris”, 1898). In the second half of the 1880s, Pissarro sometimes used the painting technique of neo-impressionism. Pissarro played one of the main roles in organizing exhibitions of the Impressionists. In his works, Camille Pissarro managed to avoid the extreme manifestation of plein air, when material objects seem to dissolve in the flickering of light and air space (“Snow in Louveciennes”; “Street in Louveciennes”, 1873). Many of his works are distinguished by an interest in the characteristic expressiveness, even portraiture, inherent in the urban landscape (“View of Rouen”, 1898)

Sisley Alfred was influenced by Camille Corot. One of the leading masters of impressionism, Sisley painted unpretentious landscapes of the surroundings of Paris, marked by subtle lyricism and sustained in a fresh and restrained light range. Sisley's landscapes, conveying the true atmosphere of Ile-de-France, preserve the special transparency and softness of natural phenomena of all seasons (“Little Square in Argenteuil”, 1872, “Flood in Marly”, 1876; “Frost in Louveciennes”, 1873, "The Edge of the Forest at Fontainebleau", 1885).

The enchanting images of nature by the artist Alfred Sisley with a slight shade of sadness captivate with an amazing transfer of mood at a given moment in time (“Bank of the Seine at Bougival”, 1876). Since the mid-1880s, features of colorful decorativeism have been growing in Sisley's work.

Conclusion: the masters of impressionism recorded their fleeting impressions, strove to capture the real world in its mobility and variability in the most natural and unbiased way. E. Manet (who was not formally a member of the Impressionist group), O. Renoir, E. Degas brought freshness and immediacy to the perception of life in art, turned to the image of instant situations snatched from the stream of reality, the spiritual life of a person, the image of strong passions, the spiritualization of nature, interest

to the national past, the desire for synthetic forms of art are combined with the motifs of world sorrow, the desire to explore and recreate the "shadow", "night" side of the human soul, with the famous "romantic irony", which allowed romantics to boldly compare and equalize high and low, tragic and comic, real and fantastic. used fragmentary, reality situations, used fragmentary, at first glance, unbalanced compositional constructions, unexpected angles, points of view, cuts of figures. In the 1870s-1880s, the landscape of French impressionism was formed: C. Monet, C. Pissarro, A. Sisley developed a consistent plein air system, created in their paintings a feeling of sparkling sunlight, richness of colors of nature, dissolution of forms in the vibration of light and air.