“Water Lilies’ is an extension of my life. Without the water, the lilies cannot live, as I am without art.”, Monet. All around you there is potential. When you look around you might see dead grass, cracked sidewalks, or broken glass on the ground. But that’s not all the world is. Because when you look around you will also see the sunlight in the morning, squirrels playing on the trees, and the wind rustling the leaves of trees. And that is what I am focusing on. How Impressionist artists saw these traits and expressed them in a new way never done before. How the artists who wanted to show the true beauty of the world changed how art was made forever.
When you think of impressionism you think about bright colors and the nature that is often found in this art style. While this is true, there is much more to the impressionism story. According to the work of Janson, Impressionism started with a man named Édouard Manet. He was the first “impressionist”, although he did not call himself this. He was known for paintings that contrasted the realism that was happening at the time with the invention of the camera. His works focused on showing the world in a new light by using the paint as part of the artwork rather than trying to make the paint seem non-existent. Others later on adapted this as well, using this painting method to get many different results with texture, and color.
As I touched on earlier, impressionism happened after the realism era. Realism happened because of the fact that the camera was invented; this allowed the painters to get more realistic and add more detail to their paintings. Impressionists wanted to make art that reflected the feeling of the world they lived in and not just what it looked like. This idea caused the impressionist revolution, and led to the more flowy art that we know now. This style of painting had never been done before. All of the previous eras had been focused on making the art look more and more realistic, and this new style where they disregarded realism and focused on feelings made many artists question if this was even real art. Very few liked this movement when it was happening; nowadays though it is one of the most popular eras because of this change.
By the time that impressionism had ended, in 1886, it had gained quite a bit of traction. Many admired the change and how it had changed the way that many artists did art. Even the realists that continuously called impressionism fake art had started to add some of the aspects of impressionism into their own art. But, like everything else, impressionism must come to an end. The beginning of the fall was when Manet passed away. Janson also said that after his passing many of the major figures of the movement stopped making impressionist art, Monet was one of the few that continued. Impressionism ended like most other art styles; the artists were getting old and new artists wanted to make different art. And why that might be the end of impressionism, that’s not the end of its influence. Art is ever changing and the never seen before art of the Impressionist Era has changed what is considered art. Before impressionism, if you were to make art like Monets, or Renoir, that wouldn’t be art and you wouldn’t be considered an artist. Impressionism has opened up the door for so many kinds of art that were never done before: abstract, expressionism, contemporary. Almost all of the art that came after were influenced by Impressionism.
Impressionism is truly one of a kind. Many of the other eras of art can easily be mistaken for one another, but not impressionism. Impressionism was the first of its kind and has forever changed how we view art and what we even consider art to be. There are many great artists and pieces of art from this era, including many of my favorite works and artists. If you too enjoy Impressionism, and love learning about art history, I highly recommend reading “History of Art Revised Fifth Edition” by H. W Janson and Anthony F. Janson. My father got this book for a college class about art history, so it goes quite in-depth over all of art history. This was my main resource for this story and I have learned much of what I know and what I have put in this paper from this book. I highly recommend looking into it if you enjoy this type of story. Remember forever after this era, art will have changed and will continue to as well. Art grows, remember to allow it.
