Louisville, Kentucky. Beginning
February 4, 2011 the Speed Art Museum will present Impressionist Landscapes:
Monet to Sargent, an exhibition of more than 60 exquisite Impressionist
paintings. Comprising some of the finest
Impressionist works from the extensive
collection of the Brooklyn Museum in New York, as well as noted works from
Kentucky collections, the exhibition presents a dazzling view of landscape
paintings by groundbreaking French, other European, and American artists of the
late 19th and early 20th centuries. Also on view will be
the exhibition The Gardens of Giverny: A View of Monet’s World,
featuring photographs of the artist’s famous garden taken in 1974
by artist Stephen Shore.
Ruth Cloudman, Chief
Curator of the Speed Art Museum, is organizing the exhibition in Louisville.
“Thanks to Brooklyn sharing their exceptional collection with us and the
generosity of Kentucky lenders, our visitors will get to experience the beauty
and innovation of Impressionist’s landscapes,” commented
Cloudman. “Since these works will
never again be shown together, this is literally a once in a lifetime
opportunity to see an extraordinary range of Impressionist paintings.”
Featuring works by
leading French artists such as Claude Monet, Gustave Courbet, Georges Seurat,
Camille Pissarro and Alfred Sisley— as well as significant American
painters that were their contemporaries, including John Singer Sargent and
Frederick Childe Hassam— this exhibition enables visitors to stroll
through cityscapes and scenes of nature as portrayed through the
Impressionists’ eyes. This vanguard of loosely associated artists
successfully immortalized for us the fleeting, surprising beauty of the everyday
through bright colors and brilliant brushwork. Their works depict lush views of
shaded woodlands, glowing fields and crashing seas, as well as rooftops at dawn
and people at play.
Monet at the
Speed
Claude Monet is
represented in Impressionist Landscapes by several works, including
Rising Tide at Pourville (1882), The Islets at Port-Villez
(1891), Vernon in the Sun (1894), and the Speed’s own
painting, The Church at Varengeville, Grey Weather (1882). Dr. Charles Venable, Speed Director, noted
that “Visitors are especially lucky to have such a fine group of oil
paintings by Monet on view in this exhibition, as well the ability to see the
hauntingly beautiful photographs of Monet’s garden by Stephen Shore. The concurrent exhibition, The Gardens at
Giverny: A View of Monet’s World, is installed in such a way that one
will be able to enter a gallery filled with Monet paintings and then enter the
magical world of his famous garden as seen through the photographs of Stephen
Shore. This will be an experience that
no one will want to
miss.”
Impressionism
Few periods in art
are more beloved today than the Impressionist era, partly because of the
revolutionary nature of the movement and its beautiful use of color. Before
Impressionism, French artists would paint mostly in their studios and their
skills were measured by the standards of the Royal Academy in France. Painting
in the 1860s and 1870s underwent dramatic changes in style and method. In
plein-air painting, artists took their canvases outdoors into nature.
Among the earliest works in the exhibition are Charles-François
Daubigny’s The River Seine at Mantes (1856) and Gustave
Courbet’s Island Rock (1862), which reveals the impact of
plein-air sketching on landscapes of the time. Heirs to the
plein-air tradition, French Impressionists such as Claude Monet, Alfred
Sisley, Camille Pissarro and Gustave Caillebotte, painted highly elaborate
“impressions” — the seemingly spontaneous, rapidly executed
landscapes that prompted the name of their movement.
Landscape
painting had been a part of the European tradition for centuries. However until the 19th century
landscapes typically served to tell a story or provide the setting for
mythological, historical or literary tales. The new generation of artists would
depict nature not as a dramatic backdrop, but as a subject of inherent beauty
and dignity. These landscapes of the late 19th century and early
20th century became popular in part because of the desires of urban
patrons who found themselves cut off from nature after having flocked to the
bustling cities of the industrial
age.
Beginning in
the mid 19th century, many artists from other European countries and
America set out to find inspiration in France, attending French art academies
and frequenting the painting locations made famous by their Barbizon and
Impressionist predecessors. Many American artists’ were especially
inspired by French Impressionism; some
even had direct contact with leading French painters, sharing landscape sights
or seeking informal guidance from admired mentors. The American works on display in the Speed’s special
exhibition demonstrate the eagerness of these artists to retain their
progressive aesthetics after returning home. Their works depict beaches,
factories, tenements and recognizable landmarks such as Central Park,
distinguished by lively broken brushwork and brilliant colors. The Americans
delighted in presenting images of people at play such as William Glackens’
Bathing at Bellport, Long Island (1912) and John Singer Sargent’s
Dolce Far Niente (1907) (loosely translated as Carefree
Idleness) or depicting locations such as in Willimantic Thread Factory
(1893) by Julian Alden Weir and Robert Spencer’s The White
Tenement (1913).
Background and Information for
Visitors
The special
companion exhibition The Gardens at Giverny: A View of Monet’s World;
Photographs by Stephen Shore is included with admission. In this 1974
portfolio, Shore captures on film the place that inspired some of Monet’s
most beloved works. Today the gardens,
and Shore’s photographs, stand as a testament to in the importance of
Giverny in Monet’s life and
work.
Admission to Impressionist
Landscapes: Monet to Sargent is $5 for Museum members, $10 for non-members.
Group rates are available by calling 502.634.2960 or by e-mailing tours@speedmuseum.org. As
a special holiday promotion, when you buy three tickets you will receive one
free through December 26, 2010. Tickets are now on sale.
Impressionist Landscapes: Monet to Sargent has been organized by the
Brooklyn
Museum.
About the Speed Art
Museum: The Speed Art
Museum is Kentucky’s largest art museum with a collection that spans 6,000
years of human creativity. It is located on historic Third Street that was
designed by Frederick Law Olmsted and is located on the main campus of the
University of Louisville.
Museum hours are
Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.; Friday 10:00 a.m. to
9:00 p.m. (open late); Sunday from 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. Galleries are closed
on Monday and
Tuesday.
For more information contact
Kirsten Popp at 502.634.2735 / kpopp@speedmuseum.org.
The
Kentucky Arts Council, the state arts agency, supports The Speed Art Museum with state tax dollars and federal funding from the National Endowment
for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great
art.
Image
Credit: Theodore Robinson,
American, 1852-1896, La Roche Guyon, 1891, oil on panel. Brooklyn Museum,
Bequest of Mrs. William A. Putnam. 41.780