The scale and subject matter were in stark contrast to the paintings of the official Salon. In place of large-scale academic or neoclassical subjects, the impressionists turned to self-portraits, flowers in a crystal vase, a view of dancers backstage, a sister at a window, or an interior just after dinner in works that were at once highly personal and introverted, wistful and dreamlike.

The art of the impressionists has an enduring appeal. Exhibitions on impressionism and impressionist artists continue to draw large crowds. Yet very little has been published that focuseson the intimate nature of much impressionist art.

Presenting over fifty works by major artists, and using the Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection of small French paintings in the National Gallery of Art as its starting point, this beautifully illustrated new volume explores two important aspects of impressionism. First, it illustrates how artists such as Degas, Monet, Morisot, Pissarro, Renoir. and Sisley sought to capture fleeting, everyday moments and ordinary objects encountered in their own lives and those of their families, friends, and servants. The scale and subject matter were in stark contrast to the paintings of the official Salon. In place of large-scale academic or neoclassical subjects, the impressionists turned to self-portraits, flowers in a crystal vase, a view of dancers backstage, a sister at a window, or an interior just after dinner in works that were at once highly personal and introverted, wistful and dreamlike.

Moreover, the author shows how the painting of earlier realist andlandscape artists such as Corot, Rousseau, Boudin, and Manet wasabsorbed into the small-scale impressionist works of an emerginggeneration of aspiring artists that included Monet, Renoir Morisot, and Pissarro. The subjects, techniques, and styles of the impressionists werecentral to the succeeding generation--artists such as Cezanne. VanGogh, Vuillard, Toulouse-Lautrec. and on to Matisse and the fauves.In an introductory essay the author explains that. when the first impres-sionist exhibition opened in April 1874, critics were shockedat thesmall-scale, "unfinished" nature of the paintings, with their unmixedpigments and broken brushwork, more akin to oil sketches. By the timeof the last impressionist exhibition in 1886 the concept of whatconstituted a finished work had changed. Smaller, sketchier paintingwas increasingly admired for its freshness and immediacy of expression,and impressionism paved the way for a radical reinterpretation by a newgeneration of artists.

Foreword

Acknowledgments

Small Is Beautiful

Open-Air Paintings

Sketches and Studies

Intimate Paintings

Paintings as Commodities

Experiments in Painting

Further Reading

Index of Artists and Titles