French Impressionism at the NGV

Pierre-Auguste Renoir was a key figure in the Impressionist movement. After his study of the Renaissance masters in Italy, Renoir became increasingly preoccupied with the lucidity and discipline of line drawing, and the purity of form. Upon his return to Paris, he developed a new style of painting that mixed form, line and volume with his luminous palette and expressive brushstrokes, producing works such as Dance at Bougival pictured to the left. Here, a happy pair dance in the village of Bougival, near Paris, a popular recreation spot for city dwellers. We see Renoir’s swift brushstrokes echo the movement of the dancers, capturing a fleeting moment in time.

Renoir’s feathery brushstrokes contrast with the thicker dabs and dashes used by Monet in a similar scene depicting his wife and a child in his garden in Argenteuil. It was while living at Argenteuil that Monet first became interested in gardening and began to integrate his efforts as a gardener and a painter.

While many of the Impressionist artists were captivated by the natural light and outdoor landscapes, others, including Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt, primarily painted scenes of urban life, depicting lively entertainment and everyday experiences with a similar energy to their counterparts. Degas developed a close friendship with American-born painter and printmaker Cassatt, and occasionally used her as a model, as in Visit to a museum. Here, two women – thought to be Mary Cassatt and her sister Lydia – examine the gilt-framed paintings that surround them, in what is probably the Louvre, with the aid of a guidebook.

Camille Pissarro was the oldest member of the Impressionist group and lived outside of Paris with his family. In 1885 he met the young painters Georges Seurat and Paul Signac who led him to swiftly adopt Neo-Impressionism’s methods of Divisionist painting. This new form called for strong, opposing dabs of colour to be painted side-by-side to create an optical colour effect, rather than the wet-on-wet application of harmonious tones favoured by the Impressionists. Two peasant women in a meadow (Le Pré) is a beautiful example of this technique.

Berthe Morisot expanded her artistic circle in Paris through Édouard Manet, her close friend, mentor and eventual brother-in-law. She quickly became a core member of the Impressionist group and participated in all but one of the eight Impressionist exhibitions. As an upper middle-class woman, Morisot was unhindered by financial hardship, allowing her to produce highly experimental works. This still life exemplifies Morisot’s immediate and direct approach to painting, with its sweeping brushstrokes that capture the subject with a minimum of loose, fluid lines and forms.

One of the highlights of our upcoming exhibition is an arresting display of sixteen masterworks by Monet, arranged in an oval room in homage to the Orangerie Museum in Paris. (Please enjoy your sneak peek!) Most of these canvases have never been displayed in Australia including the vibrant Poppy field in a hollow near Giverny. Seeking lower rent and greater rusticity, Monet moved from suburban Argenteuil to Vétheuil, and briefly Poissy, before settling in Giverny in 1883, where he would live until his death in 1926. Before he created his famed gardens and waterlily pond, Monet’s paintings primarily explored the countryside surrounding his new home. This painting is one of his first depicting the nearby fields of brilliant red poppies. Monet once reflected ‘I perhaps owe it to flowers that I became a painter.’