This exhibition was organized by the Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts.
Banner (detail) and above (left): Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (French, 1796-1875), Hay Cart along a River, 1865-70, Oil on canvas, Worcester Art Museum, Gift from the Estate of Robert W. Stoddard |
Paths to Impressionism provides a compelling overview of major developments in landscape painting during the nineteenth century, when it flourished as one of the most powerful and popular artistic expressions. Beginning in the 1820s and 1830s, a group of French artists left the city of Paris to paint in the countryside around the small village of Barbizon and the nearby ancient forest of Fontainebleau. These artists painted outdoors (en plein–air) creating nostalgic and idealized views of peasants and their agrarian way of life, and were later called the "Barbizon" school because of their association with the village. During the second half of the century, they influenced American artists who followed their lead by creating poetic scenes of cultivated landscapes in a loosely brushed style.
The Barbizon painters also inspired the next generation of landscape artists, the Impressionists, who were interested in capturing the effects of natural light in their outdoor scenes. Unlike the Barbizon painters, however, the Impressionists were intent on painting scenes of modern life, frequently showing landscapes in transition from rural scenes to ones that were becoming increasingly industrial. The Impressionists’ palette, with its brilliant colors applied in broken and highly visible strokes, is a distinguishing characteristic of their paintings and one that future generations have come to recognize and admire.