Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
nail-in-the-coffin drink in the glaring light of a four-in-the-morning café. Degas approaches
hisdancestudents,womenatwork,andcaféscenesfromoddanglesthataren'talwaysideal,
but that make the scenes seem more real.
TopaintcommonParisians livingandlovingintheafternoonsun,
Pierre-AugusteRen-
oir
headed for the fields on Butte Montmartre (near the Sacré-Cœur basilica) on Sunday
afternoons, when working-class folk would dress up and dance, drink, and eat little crêpes
(galettes)tilldark.In
DanceattheMoulindelaGalette
(
BalduMoulindelaGalette,
1876),
the sunlight filtering through the trees creates a kaleidoscope of colors—the 19th-century
equivalentofamirrorballthrowingdartsoflightontothedancers.Likeaphotographerwho
uses a slow shutter speed to show motion, Renoir paints a waltzing blur.
Next, it's the father of Impressionism,
Claude Monet.
Look for paintings from his
garden at Giverny and
The Cathedral of Rouen
(
La Cathédrale de Rouen
, 1893), “a series
of differing impressions” of the cathedral facade at various times of day and year. In all, he
did 30 paintings of the cathedral, and each is unique. The time-lapse series shows the sun
passing slowly across the sky, creating different-colored light and shadows.
Post-Impressionism:
It was
Paul Cézanne
who brought Impressionism into the 20th
century. Compared with the color of Monet, the warmth of Renoir, and Van Gogh's passion,
Cézanne's rather impersonal canvases can be difficult to appreciate. Bowls of fruit, land-
scapes,andafewportraitswereCézanne'spassion.Becauseofhisstyle(nothiscontent),he
is often called the first modern painter.
Find his paintings in room 36. In
Landscape
(
Rochers près des Grottes au-dessus de
Château-Noir,
1904), Cézanne uses chunks of green, tan, and blue paint as building blocks
to construct this rocky brown cliff. These chunks are like little “cubes” (a style that later in-
fluencedthe...Cubists).ThesubjectsofCézanne's
TheCardPlayers
(
LesJoueursdeCartes
,
c. 1890-1895) aren't people—they're studies in color and pattern. The subject matter—two
guys playing cards—is less important than the pleasingly balanced pattern they make on the
canvas, two sloping forms framing a cylinder (a bottle) in the center. Later, abstract artists
would focus solely on shapes and colors.
Like Michelangelo, Beethoven, Rembrandt, Wayne Newton, and a select handful of oth-
ers,
Vincent vanGogh
put somuch ofhimself into his workthat art and life became one. In
the Orsay's collection of Van Goghs (level 2), you'll see both the artist's painting style and
his life unfold.
Encouraged by his art-dealer brother, Van Gogh moved to Paris, and
voilà!
The color!
He met Monet, drank with Paul Gauguin and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and soaked up the
Impressionist style. In his
Self-Portrait, Paris
(
Portrait de l'Artiste
, 1887), you can see how
he built a bristling brown beard with thick, side-by-side strokes of red, yellow, and green.
The social life of Paris became too much for the solitary Van Gogh, and he moved to
southernFrance.Atfirst,intheglowofthebrightspringsunshine,hehadaperiodofincred-
