The Man Who Made Monet
February 23, 2015 4:24 AM Subscribe
Oh hey, I saw this exhibition in Paris. It was good, if you're in London you should see it. (Or in Philadelphia, this summer.)
It was also kind of small and, well, not uniquely interesting given all the other impressionist riches on display all over Paris. The story is fantastic though, and I love the idea of this one dealer playing such a long game before finding success.
posted by Nelson at 6:26 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
It was also kind of small and, well, not uniquely interesting given all the other impressionist riches on display all over Paris. The story is fantastic though, and I love the idea of this one dealer playing such a long game before finding success.
posted by Nelson at 6:26 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
I highly recommend the Musée Marmottan in Paris. Didn't catch the Durand exhibition unfortunately.
posted by ellieBOA at 6:42 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by ellieBOA at 6:42 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
I wondered if Morisot would be mentioned, and she is, offhandedly. "Five or six lunatics, of whom one is a woman [Berthe Morisot], have chosen to exhibit their works. " Cassat is also mentioned, but not as an artist so much. It's sad that the one Impressionist who showed at every exhibition (Morisot) is so often neglected in overviews of the work.
Otherwise, really interesting article, but I agree with Quilford that it doesn't go into detail about the most interesting question, in what turned the public's minds about this format?
posted by xingcat at 6:56 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
Otherwise, really interesting article, but I agree with Quilford that it doesn't go into detail about the most interesting question, in what turned the public's minds about this format?
posted by xingcat at 6:56 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
All you have to do to save impressionism from obscurity is take a few steps back.
posted by srboisvert at 7:20 AM on February 23, 2015 [6 favorites]
posted by srboisvert at 7:20 AM on February 23, 2015 [6 favorites]
If critical and popular taste was initially against it, as the article says, what caused the change in thought?
According to the Grauniad article, this may have had something to do with it:
Durand-Ruel sailed [to New York] with 300 pictures (even though Monet was concerned about seeing his pictures “leave the country for the land of the Yankees”) and found there a new, unprejudiced type of collector eager for impressionist art. “The Americans do not laugh,” said Durand-Ruel, “they buy.” Durand-Ruel is the reason why America has more impressionist works than anywhere else outside France.
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:39 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
According to the Grauniad article, this may have had something to do with it:
Durand-Ruel sailed [to New York] with 300 pictures (even though Monet was concerned about seeing his pictures “leave the country for the land of the Yankees”) and found there a new, unprejudiced type of collector eager for impressionist art. “The Americans do not laugh,” said Durand-Ruel, “they buy.” Durand-Ruel is the reason why America has more impressionist works than anywhere else outside France.
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:39 AM on February 23, 2015 [1 favorite]
the most interesting question, in what turned the public's minds about this format
I doubt, in the end, that that's an answerable question. That is, the answer to "why did tastes change" is simply that "tastes changed." I think you can make something of a plausible case that art creates the tastes by which it comes to be judged--that is, that once you have a large enough body of impressionist work out there and people get sufficiently exposed to it they learn to understand what the artists were trying to achieve in creating it--but while some of that certainly goes on (we see this phenomenon all the time, of the "avant-garde" becoming central to the canon) it can only ever be part of the story (after all, what explains the appeal of the new art form that creates sufficient works in that style for public taste to be educated by them? What accounts for the fact that works in older styles fall out of public favor--and back in again--in unpredictable ways?).
At some level all we can say is that something like the kind of partially-random, partially motivated drive for novelty-within-continuity that drives fashion generally is at work.
As for the thesis of the article (and the show it's reviewing), it's a little overstated. Or, at least, unguarded. We really don't know that if Durand-Ruel had never been born the history of Impressionism would have been substantially different. That is, it's not really clear that if he hadn't played the role he did no other person or people would have stepped in to play much the same role.
posted by yoink at 8:46 AM on February 23, 2015 [2 favorites]
I doubt, in the end, that that's an answerable question. That is, the answer to "why did tastes change" is simply that "tastes changed." I think you can make something of a plausible case that art creates the tastes by which it comes to be judged--that is, that once you have a large enough body of impressionist work out there and people get sufficiently exposed to it they learn to understand what the artists were trying to achieve in creating it--but while some of that certainly goes on (we see this phenomenon all the time, of the "avant-garde" becoming central to the canon) it can only ever be part of the story (after all, what explains the appeal of the new art form that creates sufficient works in that style for public taste to be educated by them? What accounts for the fact that works in older styles fall out of public favor--and back in again--in unpredictable ways?).
At some level all we can say is that something like the kind of partially-random, partially motivated drive for novelty-within-continuity that drives fashion generally is at work.
As for the thesis of the article (and the show it's reviewing), it's a little overstated. Or, at least, unguarded. We really don't know that if Durand-Ruel had never been born the history of Impressionism would have been substantially different. That is, it's not really clear that if he hadn't played the role he did no other person or people would have stepped in to play much the same role.
posted by yoink at 8:46 AM on February 23, 2015 [2 favorites]
I think Schopenhauer's quote about truth has some relevance in matters of collective artistic taste:
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Of course, he wasn't talking about art at all, but it seems to me that many new artistic styles/movements/modes of expression go through this process in some form. I think that people first rejected Impressionist art because of its newness, its then-weirdness. But gradually, some people looked at it and thought hey, this is pretty great, actually. Then they started talking to their friends about it, explaining 'how' they're seeing this new-fangled kind of painting, why it's meaningful, and so forth, until the weirdness fades and the creative ideas come to the fore for enough individuals that collective opinion shifts.
It just seems like most creative work in new modes has to get past the visceral reaction of challenging people's tastes before it can be seen (/heard/experienced/etc.) on its own terms. And for work that is truly new, the audience needs to learn how to see/hear/etc. the work before they can make sense of it, and that usually takes a bit of time.
posted by LooseFilter at 9:01 AM on February 23, 2015
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Of course, he wasn't talking about art at all, but it seems to me that many new artistic styles/movements/modes of expression go through this process in some form. I think that people first rejected Impressionist art because of its newness, its then-weirdness. But gradually, some people looked at it and thought hey, this is pretty great, actually. Then they started talking to their friends about it, explaining 'how' they're seeing this new-fangled kind of painting, why it's meaningful, and so forth, until the weirdness fades and the creative ideas come to the fore for enough individuals that collective opinion shifts.
It just seems like most creative work in new modes has to get past the visceral reaction of challenging people's tastes before it can be seen (/heard/experienced/etc.) on its own terms. And for work that is truly new, the audience needs to learn how to see/hear/etc. the work before they can make sense of it, and that usually takes a bit of time.
posted by LooseFilter at 9:01 AM on February 23, 2015
It just seems like most creative work in new modes has to get past the visceral reaction of challenging people's tastes before it can be seen (/heard/experienced/etc.) on its own terms. And for work that is truly new, the audience needs to learn how to see/hear/etc. the work before they can make sense of it, and that usually takes a bit of time.
I think this is true, but it has pretty much zero explanatory power. That is, we're still left with the unaccountable fact that there are works that never get over the "that's weird, ugh" hill. And there are works that do, but then eventually fall out of public favor. So while I think it's true that the process you describe happens, it can never really tell us why this particular movement became widely beloved while this other one didn't, or why the movement that is widely beloved today becomes universally despised a generation or so later.
posted by yoink at 9:40 AM on February 23, 2015
I think this is true, but it has pretty much zero explanatory power. That is, we're still left with the unaccountable fact that there are works that never get over the "that's weird, ugh" hill. And there are works that do, but then eventually fall out of public favor. So while I think it's true that the process you describe happens, it can never really tell us why this particular movement became widely beloved while this other one didn't, or why the movement that is widely beloved today becomes universally despised a generation or so later.
posted by yoink at 9:40 AM on February 23, 2015
I think it's true that the process you describe happens, it can never really tell us why this particular movement became widely beloved while this other one didn't
Definitely, but if an explanation like you describe is available, I've yet to hear of it, and it would be the absolute holy grail of artistic creation. I think this gets to the heart of why creative pursuits are so difficult to justify in objective terms (e.g., education, financial support) and thus so often struggle in a free market society: so many people know the power and importance of creative work personally, but it really is hard to explain why in any clear, empirical way. And the work that may be most important, most deserving of financial support, may appear confusing, weird, or stupid at first.
posted by LooseFilter at 9:58 AM on February 23, 2015
Definitely, but if an explanation like you describe is available, I've yet to hear of it, and it would be the absolute holy grail of artistic creation. I think this gets to the heart of why creative pursuits are so difficult to justify in objective terms (e.g., education, financial support) and thus so often struggle in a free market society: so many people know the power and importance of creative work personally, but it really is hard to explain why in any clear, empirical way. And the work that may be most important, most deserving of financial support, may appear confusing, weird, or stupid at first.
posted by LooseFilter at 9:58 AM on February 23, 2015
Inventing Impressionism review – a superb exhibition in every respect.
posted by ellieBOA at 11:57 PM on March 7, 2015
posted by ellieBOA at 11:57 PM on March 7, 2015
« Older Quotas can work if you set them yourself | A thoroughgoing rejection of science, technology... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by Quilford at 6:14 AM on February 23, 2015