Allen Memorial Art Museum: "Picturing Paris: Monet & the Modern City"
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
Wisteria, 1919–20 Oil on canvas R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1960.5Monet, one of the founders of Impressionism—which takes its name from his 1872 painting titled, "Impression, Sunrise"—was known for his landscapes painted "en plein air," or outdoors. This late work by Monet—with its closely cropped viewpoint, thick brushstrokes, and palpable energetic movement—demonstrates the artist's late Impressionist style, which was a forerunner of later 20th-century abstraction.Since the 1890s, when Monet first began cultivating the garden at his house in Giverny, the artist considered painting a suite of murals celebrating the lily pond there. A small Japanese footbridge covered with wisteria flowers vertically expanded the floral display, inspirating a series of works depicting wisteria. The project did not take shape until years later, in 1914, when the statesman Georges Clemenceau encouraged Monet to undertake it. The painting seen here remained in Monet's studio until after his death.
Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1829–1869)
Night Rain at Akasaka Kiribatake (Akasaka Kiribatake uchū yūkei), from the series "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (Meisho Edo hyakkei)," 1859 Color woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.1413
Félix Bracquemond (French, 1833–1914)
La Terasse de la Villa Brancas, 1876 Etching Richard Lee Ripin Art Purchase Fund, 2023.42 (recent acquisition)Félix Bracquemond captured a fleeting moment of an artist sketching a woman on the balcony at Villa Brancas in Sévres just southwest of Paris. The artist in this etching was Bracquemond's wife Marie Bracquemond (1841–1916), and the sitter was likely Marie's sister Louise Quiveron—who frequently appeared in Marie's artworks.Marie Bracquemond was one of four leading women artists to exhibit with the Société Anonyme des Artistes (later referred to as the Impressionist Exhibition), showing her work in the 1879, 1880, and 1886 exhibitions. However, prior to this, she had great success at the formal Salon. She was informally trained by the French academic painter, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and her first submission to the Salon was accepted in 1857 when she was just 16 years old.
MONET’S PARIS, 1867
By 1867, Monet established himself in Paris, having returned to the city from Le Havre in 1864. He was surrounded by a supportive network of artists, like Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Frédéric Bazille, Alfred Sisley, the writer Émile Zola, and musician Edmond Maître. Monet achieved great success at the Salons of 1865 and 1866 and began developing early intimations of his signature Impressionist style.Paris, however, was rapidly changing at that time. Even in the waning years of Baron Georges- Eugène Haussmann's project to modernize Paris (1853–1870), the city nearly doubled in size with the annexation of neighboring towns. In 1867, Paris also hosted the Exposition Universelle, which celebrated the industrial progress and modernity of the Second Empire. It is probably due to this renewed interest in the city that Monet and Renoir began painting views of Paris in 1867.On April 27, 1867, Monet and Renoir requested permission from the Imperial Director of Fine Arts to paint "views of Paris from the windows of the Louvre." This effort resulted in the three views from the Louvre displayed here: "Saint Germain l'Auxerrois" (Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin), "Le Jardin de l'Infante" (Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin), and "Le Quai du Louvre" (Kunstmuseum, the Hague). In 1869, Monet submitted these three views to the increasingly conservative Salon, but naturally, his ultra-modern cityscapes were rejected.
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
Garden of the Princess, Louvre, 1867 Oil on canvas R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1948.296
HAUSSMANN AND THE MAKING OF MODERN PARIS
Like many European cities, Paris was once comprised of countless narrow, dark, winding streets. During numerous political uprisings (in 1789, 1830, and 1848), revolutionaries used Paris's medieval streets to their advantage, erecting makeshift defensive barricades against royal and imperial forces.This changed during the Second Empire (1852–1870) when Emperor Napoléon III hired Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann to reenvision Paris as a great imperial city. Napoléon's plan was twofold: to bring modern technology and amenities to the city and to widen and regularize city streets. This not only encouraged the flow of commerce but, more importantly, helped imperial troops suppress political revolts.The "Haussmannization" of Paris brought clean water, modern sewers, and gas lanterns to illuminate the streets—making the fast-growing city much safer. Haussmann also added scenic parks, theaters, and chic shops; regularized the façades of administrative buildings and apartments; and constructed better hospitals, asylums, and prisons. As much as this improved Paris for many, it also displaced the working class and pushed the most vulnerable people to the outskirts of the city. In addition, Haussmann's radical gentrification cloaked everything in dust and debris for nearly 20 years. While some artists in this exhibition celebrate the myth of modern Paris as the "City of Light," others, like Honoré Daumier and Charles Marville, show a different side of Haussmann's Paris.
Paul Cézanne (French, 1839–1906)
Pine Tree at Bellevue (Paysage provençal), 1883–85 Watercolor and graphite on paper Gift of Paul Rosenberg and Co., 1962.38This drawing was made in southern France near Aix-en-Provence at Bellevue, which became the property of the artist's brother-in-law in 1885. Cézanne's study and interpretation of the Provençal landscape constantly evolved. While he was interested in recording its constant flux, he also wanted to capture what he considered to be its eternal qualities. In this drawing, both movement and solidity are suggested, from the free strokes describing the shrubs and foliage at the left to the more contained modeling of the large tree at the right. This same tree appears in several of Cézanne's paintings and other drawings.
Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
Inconvenient d'envoyer un mauvais tableau à l'exposition.... (The Disadvantage of Sending a Bad Painting to the Exhibition...), from the series Les Artistes, 1848 Lithograph Gift of Eugene L. Garbaty, 1954.120Daumier frequently depicted the trials and tribulations of the artist struggling for recognition. New talent was often frustrated by the old-fashioned and stifling aesthetic values of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, whose annual exhibition or "Salon" was an artist's primary means of being discovered. Here an artist complains that his landscape painting—a genre considered inferior by the Royal Academy—has received a poor reception at the Salon.Although Claude Monet experienced early success at the Salons of 1865 and 1866, his luck changed in 1867. Conservative jurors rejected approximately two-thirds of the submissions to the Salon that year, including two paintings by Monet: a traditional seascape and an unconventional leisure scene of four contemporary middle-class women in a garden.
Alfred Sisley (British, active in France, 1839–1899)
The Loing Canal at Moret, ca. 1892 Oil on canvas Gift of Joseph and Enid Bissett, 1960.99Although he was often overshadowed by his contemporaries Monet and Renoir, Sisley was a quintessential representative of the Impressionist movement. After spending some years in Paris, Sisley lived in several villages along the Seine and Loing rivers; he settled permanently in Moret-sur-Loing in 1889.In this work, Sisley's freely applied paint activates the surface of the canvas to convey the effect of brilliant sunlight reflecting off the leaves of the trees and the water in the canal below. Specific details are secondary to the synthesis of color and light in the definition of the forms of the trees, the canal, and the architecture. In contrast to Monet's tendency to dissolve form in a bath of light and color, Sisley used light and color to enhance the structure of his compositions. He felt that lively brushstrokes and "impasto" were the most significant aspects of a work and it "should transmit to the beholder the sensation which possessed the artist" to depict the subject.
Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
Voila donc mon pot de fleurs qui va avoir du soleil... (There now! My flower pot will have some sun...), from the series Les Actualitésfrom the series Les Actualités, 1852 Lithograph Gift of Eugene L. Garbaty, 1954.145
Charles Marville (French, 1813–1879)
Rue Fresnel de l'impasse de Versailles (Rue Fresnel, as seen from the Versailles cul-del-sac) , 1865–69 Vintage albumen print from a wet collodion glass negative Oberlin Friends of Art Fund, 2011.18Emperor Napoleon III and Georges-Eugène Haussmann hired Charles Marville as the official photographer of Paris to document the city before, during, and after demolition. Photography was a revolutionary tool in recording Paris's transition during the Second Empire. Many of Marville's photographs combine fine archival detail and documentary value with an eerily poetic quality.When Marville photographed this narrow, winding, cobblestoned street in the heart of Old Paris—called Rue Fresnel—he knew that it was about to disappear forever and that its inhabitants, such as the woman leaning out of the second-story window, would be forced to relocate elsewhere. A wider, straighter street and new uniform stone-clad buildings would be built on the site of these crumbling relics.
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
"Saint Germain l'Auxerrois," 1867 Oil on canvas Alte Nationalegalerie 1906 gift from the bankers Karl Hagen and Karl Steinbart, Berlin, AI 984This painting combines "old" and "new" Parisian monuments. Directly opposite the Louvre is the Gothic church of Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois—constructed between the 13th and 16th centuries—framed by conspicuously modern and spacious apartment buildings. Probably the first of the three cityscapes that Monet painted from the Louve in 1867, this is the only view explicitly mentioned in his letter requesting access.The fragmentary nature of this cityscape resembles 19th-century architectural photography, which was newly offered for sale at the time. The recognizability of these monuments reflects Monet's interest in the city's architecture and his attempts to capture a fleeting moment in Paris.
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
Garden of the Princess, Louvre, 1867 Oil on canvas R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1948.296Garden of the Princess, Louvre, with its vertical format and sloping, asymmetrical composition, is a significant departure from Monet's other Paris cityscapes painted in 1867: " Quai du Louvre and Saint Germain l'Auxerrois." The oblique viewpoint and narrow vertical orientation may have been inspired by Japanese woodblock prints that Monet would have seen at the Exposition Universelle of 1867.The dome of the Pantheon appears in the center distance, flanked by the church of St. Etienne-du-Mont and the dome of the Sorbonne. The Île de la Cité is in the middle ground, separated from the Right Bank by the Seine, of which a small part is visible at right, under the French flag. The foreground, painted in brilliant green, shows the Garden of the Princess ("Jardin de l'Infante"), named for a Spanish princess who was briefly engaged to Louis XV in 1722, and whose apartments under the Galerie d'Apollon looked out over the garden.
Suzanne Benton (American, b. 1936)
Young Lady Graduates, Oberlin College, 1855, 1997 Monoprint with chine-collé Gift of Mrs. Annabel Shanklin Perlik (OC 1949), 2009.29Nestled among this print's layered colorful shapes is a historic photograph of 17 women, the graduates of the Oberlin College Class of 1855. The two women in the front wearing bonnets were married to prominent men on Oberlin's campus and were leaders in their own right: Marianne Parker Dascomb (left) was the first Principal of the Women's Department, and Elizabeth Atkinson Finney (right) was a member of the Women's Board of Managers.Artist and feminist Suzanne Benton's work highlights female empowerment and here celebrates the academic success of these trailblazing women. In this and in other works centered around the women of Oberlin's history, such as a print of Mary Church Terrell on view in the main library, Benton brings out the individuals and experiences behind Oberlin's often-cited early progressive policies, particularly those dealing with race and gender.
Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910)
Art-Students and Copyist in the Louvre Gallery, Paris, from Harper's Weekly, January 11, 1868, 1868 Wood engraving Mrs. F. F. Prentiss Fund, 1955.2By the 19th century, many young artists still participated in the traditional academic practice of studying masterworks—primarily grand "history paintings"—displayed in the Louvre. Copying was an essential part of their formal education.The American artist Winslow Homer created this print of women artists studying in the Grande Galerie of the Louvre a few months after Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir also held a short residency there. However, rather than exploring the art inside the Louvre as the subjects of this print are doing, Monet and Renoir flouted tradition and focused on the contemporary spirit of Paris and its changing cityscape.
Camille Pissarro (French, 1830–1903)
Pont Neuf, Paris, 1901 Oil on canvas R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1941.49In 1900, Pissarro took an apartment on the Île de La Cité in Paris, from which he undertook an extensive series of paintings of surrounding views along the Seine. Pissarro's vantage point offered a plunging perspective that accentuated the steep difference of levels between rooftops, bridge, boats, and the Seine River itself.In this painting of the Pont Neuf, the bridge that links the Île de la Cité to the Right Bank, the brushwork is looser and the colors more unified than in his earlier Pointillist compositions. By eliminating certain whites and thinning his mineral oil medium with turpentine, Pissarro was able to achieve purer colors while heightening the transparency of the hues. The evenly cast haze saturates every part of the picture. Painted "wet on wet," the different colors dissolve into each other, creating a subtle fusion of the natural elements.
Félix-Hilaire Buhot (French, 1847–1898)
La Fête Nationale au Boulevard Clichy, 1878 Etching, drypoint, and aquatint Gift of Edward J. Olszewski in memory of Monica Olszewski, 2017.46.3
Joseph Pennell (American, 1857–1926)
Le Stryge, Notre-Dame Cathedral, Paris, 1893 Etching Friends of Art Endowment Fund, 1978.10
Utagawa Hiroshige I 初代目歌川広重 (Japanese, 1797–1858)
The Plum Orchard in Kameido (Kameido Umeyashiki), from the series "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (Meisho Edo hyakkei)," 1857 Color woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.1396
Hilaire-Germain-Edgar Degas (French, 1834–1917)
Mary Cassatt at the Louvre: The Paintings Gallery, 1879–80 (restrike) Etching and aquatint Gift of Ellen H. Johnson, 1975.168
Finnegan Shannon (American, b. 1989)
Do you want us here or not (MHR)—Bench , 2021 Plywood and paint Museum Friends Fund, 2022.38 (recent acquisition)Physical precarity and accessibility are central themes in Shannon's work. Even well-intentioned designs often prioritize an able-bodied experience, requiring adaptation and resulting in exhaustion. Shannon's benches, stools, and cushions, collectively titled Do you want us here or not? are intended to be used. They center the experiences of people with disabilities and invoke forms of activism, such as sit-ins, which bring visibility to a cause without requiring one to march or stand for hours.
Eugène Boudin (French, 1824–1898)
Haymaking (Le Foins), ca. 1880 Oil on oak panel Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Morse Woodbury, 1966.16When Monet was a teenager, working primarily as a caricature artist, he met Boudin who became one of his earliest mentors. Boudin was a member of the Barbizon School, a group of artists based in the Barbizon village (just outside the Forest of Fontainebleau) who promoted the importance of landscape painting. Boudin encouraged Monet to focus on landscapes and complete compositions " en plein air."There is an airy quality to Boudin's painting that is enhanced by the soft, loose brushwork. This painting was likely painted outdoors where Boudin loved to work. In his journal, he wrote, "Everything that is painted directly and on the spot always has a strength, a power, a vivacity of touch that cannot be recovered in the studio...three strokes of the brush in front of nature are worth more than two days' work in the studio." Although Boudin only participated in the first Impressionist group exhibition in 1874, he had a lasting influence on several of the group's members, particularly Monet.
CLAUDE MONET AND UTAGAWA HIROSHIGE I
Although it is unclear when Monet was first exposed to Japanese prints, he likely saw the masterful works of artists like Utagawa Hiroshige I (初代目歌川広重) at Paris's Exposition Universelle of 1867. Monet began collecting Japanese woodblock prints in earnest after visiting a spice shop in Holland where the store owners—unaware of the prints' value—had been using them as wrapping paper. At the time of Monet's death, he had amassed a comprehensive collection of more than 200 Japanese woodblock prints. Evidently, "Pictures of the Floating World" were an important source of inspiration for him.Comparing these three works by Hiroshige to Monet's "Garden of the Princess, Louvre" (1867) we can see how he appropriated some of the visual language of Japanese landscape traditions into his cityscape of Paris. Both artists use strong diagonals and asymmetry in their compositions. The landscapes' sloping perspectives emphasize the flatness of the pictorial surface—which would become a key tenant of modern art. Of the three cityscapes painted in 1867, "Garden of the Princess, Louvre," is the only one where Monet adopted a narrow vertical format; he likely took inspiration from Japanese hanging scrolls.
Shared Art: Suzanne Benton
Katsushika Hokusai 葛飾北斎 (Japanese, 1760–1849)
The Poetess Ono no Komachi, from an untitled series of the Six Immortal Poets, ca. 1815 Color woodblock print ("nishiki-e"); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.768
Mary Cassatt (American, 1845–1926)
Feeding the Ducks, 1895 Drypoint and aquatint R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1957.19
JAPAN, PARIS, AND THE EXPOSITION UNIVERSELLE OF 1867
Impressionism grew from French movements like Realism and the Barbizon School practice of painting landscapes "en plein air." However, an important source of inspiration for artists like Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, and Mary Cassatt were woodblock prints and decorative arts from Japan.In 1603, Japan established a "sakoku" (closed country) policy that lasted for nearly two centuries, which restricted contact with the Western world. In 1853, when Japanese ports reopened to trade with the West, Europeans had access to an influx of luxury goods like woodblock prints, lacquer objects, and silk. However, it was at the Japanese Pavilion at Paris's Exposition Universelle of 1867 that Europeans experienced their first formal exhibition of Japanese arts and crafts. European artists were drawn to the narrow vertical formats of hanging scrolls, as well as the solid areas of bold colors, strong diagonals, and rhythmic patterns in Japanese woodblock prints.
Johan Barthold Jongkind (Dutch, 1819 –1891)
Démolition de la rue des Francs-Bourgeois Saint Marcel , 1873Etching, with aquatint, in black on ivory laid paper Purchased with funds from Carl Read Gerber (OC 1958) i n honor of Katherine Solender (OC 1977), 2024.28 (recent acquisition)Jongkind and the Barbizon School painter Eugène Boudin were two of Monet's earliest and most influential artistic mentors. While Boudin was the first supporter to encourage Monet to paint landscapes "en plein air," Jongkind was the one who inspired him to take greater artistic liberties with his compositions and focus on painting the fleeting materiality of light.Jongkind enjoyed sketching in and around Paris, captivated by Georges-Eugène Haussmann's ongoing demolition work in the heart of the historic city. This etching records the 1868 demolition of Francs-Bourgeois Saint Marcel Street (once located in the 13th arrondissement). Jongkind captured a moment in Haussmann's Paris: streets disrupted by rubble, thick clouds of smoke looming overhead, and a worker dismantling the roof of an old building.
Utagawa Hiroshige I 初代目歌川広重 (Japanese, 1797–1858)
Light Rain on Nihon Bridge, from the series "Famous Places in the Eastern Capital," 1830s Color woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.1095
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Monet beside the wisteria covered bridge at Giverny.
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
Impression, Sunrise, 1872. Oil on canvas. Musée Marmottan, Paris.
Berthe Morisot (French, 1841–1895)
Jeune fille au canapé, 1889 Drypoint Gift of Betty L. Beer Franklin (OC 1965) in honor of Stephanie Wiles, AMAM Director from 2004–2011, 2013.20.1Morisot was one of the few women artists invited to exhibit with the Société Anonyme des Artistes and was featured in the group's first exhibition in 1874 (later known as the first Impressionist exhibition). She participated in all but one of the eight Impressionist exhibitions (held between 1874 and 1886).However, Morisot began her career like many other academically-trained artists: copying masterworks in the Louvre and studying "en plein-air" painting under the Barbizon School artist Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot. In 1864, she began exhibiting works at the Paris Salon and had regular success at the government-sponsored exhibition for a decade. In the 1860s, Morisot developed a lifelong friendship with the French Realist Édouard Manet and posed for many of his paintings.
Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
Une promenade d'agrément aux Champs-Elysées (A pleasant stroll on the Champs-Élysées), from the series Les Actualités series Les Actualités, 1855 Lithograph Gift of Eugene L. Garbaty, 1954.156During the Second Empire (1852–1870), Georges-Eugène Haussmann transformed Paris into a sprawling construction site. Here, Daumier depicts a well-to-do couple taking an afternoon stroll on the fashionable Champs-Élysées. This avenue, which stretches from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concord, is known for its chic cafes, luxury shops, and theaters. Despite the chaotic Haussmann-era construction taking place, the couple is determined to promenade.
Emile Auguste Carolus-Duran (French, 1838–1917)
Portrait of Philippe Burty, 1874 Oil on canvas R. T. Miller Jr. Fund, 1994.9Philippe Burty (1830–1890) was one of the more progressive art critics and writers of his generation, writing for journals that focused on innovations and developments in the visual arts. In particular, he was one of the earliest and most outspoken champions of the Impressionist movement and coined the term Japonisme, reflecting the contemporary taste for Japanese art and culture in France.
Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
Voilà pourtant notre chambre nuptiale, Adélaïde... (That used to be our nuptial chamber, Adelaide...), from the series Croquis Parisiens , 1853 Lithograph Gift of Eugene L. Garbaty, 1954.147
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841–1919)
Landscape at Cagnes (Renoir's Garden), ca. 1914 Oil on canvas A. Augustus Healy Fund, 1942.119Depicted here is a view of the garden at Renoir's villa, Les Collettes at Cagnes-sur-Mer, in the south of France. The effects of the artist's rheumatoid arthritis forced him to spend more and more time in this warmer climate, where he settled permanently in 1907.Among the Impressionists, Renoir had perhaps the most distinctive painting style, resulting mainly from his "rainbow" palette, which consisted of intense, pure tones and almost no black. By the time he produced this late work, he had long abandoned the primary Impressionist concerns with the study of light and color in nature, in favor of a more linear style and a highly charged decorative palette. Although certain areas are worked up with light "impasto" (thickly applied paint layers with visible texture), most of the surface is smooth and at times quite sparse betraying loose brushwork and fluid pigment.
THE FIRST IMPRESSIONISTS
For young French artists in the mid-19th century, entry into the annual government-sponsored exhibition known as the Salon was the only place to establish their reputations and gain favor with critics and patrons alike. A favorable Salon review could launch an artist's career. By the 1860s, however, the Salon jury had grown increasingly conservative, rejecting artworks that deviated from a polished, academic style.In 1874, Claude Monet and Edgar Degas established the Société Anonyme des Artistes, holding an exhibition at the former studio of photographer Gaspard-Félix Tournachon (called "Nadar"). The exhibition included works by about 30 artists including Monet, Degas, Eugène Boudin, Paul Cézanne, Camille Pissarro, Berthe Morisot, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Alfred Sisley. Thanks to a satirical review of the exhibition, published by critic Louis Leroy in "Le Charivari," called "Exhibition of the Impressionists"—inspired by Monet's painting, "Impression, Sunrise"—the term "Impressionism" was coined. As the movement evolved, Impressionism came to be associated with broad painterly brushstrokes, flattening of pictorial space, and attempts to capture the fleeting quality of light.This exhibition features work by many of the major artists who participated in the first Impressionist exhibition of 1874, and also highlights the contributions of other artists—like Mary Cassatt, Johan Barthold Jongkind, and Marie and Félix Bracquemond—who also played important roles in the development of Impressionist art.
Charles Meryon (French, 1821–1868)
Saint-Etienne-du-Mont, Paris, 1852 Etching Gift of Paul F. Walter (OC 1957), 1968.54
Utagawa Hiroshige I 初代目歌川広重 (Japanese, 1797–1858)
The Kinryūzan Temple in Asakusa (Asakusa Kinryūzan), from the series "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (Meisho Edo hyakkei)," 1856–58 Color woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.1443
DOMESTIC SCENES
Many of the Japanese "ukiyo-e" prints (pictures of the floating world) available in France at the end of the 19th century depicted domestic scenes of women and children. Mary Cassatt, an American artist living in Paris, was a good friend of Edgar Degas and likely drew inspiration from his extensive collection of Japanese prints.The Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris held a large-scale exhibition of Japanese prints in 1890. This exhibition is said to have renewed Cassatt's interest in printmaking and inspired her to create a series focusing on women and children, a significant subject in her work from that point onward. During the 19th century, a shift in social understanding regarded childhood as a mirror of society, leading many upper-class mothers to take a more active role in child-rearing. Cassatt's work focused on these moments of intimacy and familiarity between women and children in the domestic sphere.Like the print of "The Poetess Ono no Komachi by Katsushika Hokusai" (葛飾北斎), Cassatt's print incorporates flat expanses of bold, saturated colors into her scene of two women and a child feeding ducks. Both artists also employ rich patterns in the figure's garments, further flattening the pictorial space of the compositions.
CAN A SINGLE WORK OF ART BUILD COMMUNITY?
The annual Shared Art Program brings together all incoming Oberlin College and Conservatory students by using a single artwork as the starting point for conversations about who we are and where we have come from. The Shared Art Committee selected this work for its ability to humanize Oberlin's history and foster dialogues about class, race, and gender in the past and the present. Organized by Emily French, Interim Curator of Academic Programs, and Shared Art Committee members Miriam Barnhill-Wright (OC 2027), Joanne Kim (OC 2026), Mimi Montefiore (OC 2025), Tanisha Shende (OC 2026), and Sereena Sperry (OC 2027)
Honoré Daumier (French, 1808–1879)
Le Gamin de Paris aux Tuileries (The Paris Street Urchin at the Tuileries), 1848 Lithograph General Acquisitions Fund, 1944.189.17This print evokes the storming of the Tuileries Palace by the people of Paris—represented by the "gamin de Paris" (Parisian street urchin)—on the night of King Louis-Philippe's abdication.Legend says, the royal throne the boy finds so comfortable was later carried through the streets of Paris and burned, but only after Parisians took turns trying it out. The message is clear: under a republic, even a child of the people has the right to sit on the symbolic seat of power.
THE PICTORIAL
Inspired by Japanese woodblock prints, the Impressionists incorporated enlarged pictorial elements into their compositions, placing them in the foreground, flat against the picture plane. Nearby, we can see how French artists Henri-Joseph Harpignies and Edgar Degas exploited these compositional techniques. Although Harpignies's style fell somewhere between the Barbizon School and the Impressionists——his late painting demonstrates the adoption of motifs found in Impressionist and Japanese art, particularly, the use of minimal shading or modulation to create a sense of depth. Like Monet, Degas also owned a sizeable collection of Japanese woodblock prints, which likely inspired this radical composition of his friend and fellow Impressionist artist Mary Cassatt at the Louvre. Closely cropped at the edges, Degas shows Cassatt in a tightly enclosed space with the figures viewed from a slightly elevated position, reminiscent of Japanese pillar prints that were designed in a narrow vertical format. The absorption on his friend's face as she studies her book and the narrow vertical format that abruptly cuts off the figures are evocative of Degas's experimental "snapshot" aesthetic of printmaking (inspired by his work as a photographer).
Charles Meryon (French, 1821–1868)
Le Pont-au-Change, Paris, 1854 Etching Mrs. F. F. Prentiss Bequest, 1944.67
Utagawa Hiroshige I 初代目歌川広重 (Japanese, 1797–1858)
Cherry Blossoms at Koganei in Musashi Province, no. 12 from the series "Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji," 1858 Color woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Mary A. Ainsworth Bequest, 1950.1470
Henri-Joseph Harpignies (French, 1819–1916)
Landscape, 1907 Oil on mahogany panel Charles Martin Hall Bequest (OC 1885), 1915.54
Charles Meryon (French, 1821–1868)
L'Abside de Notre Dame de Paris (The Apse of Notre Dame Cathedral), 1854 Etching Mrs. F. F. Prentiss Bequest, 1944.68
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
"Quai du Louvre," 1867 Oil on canvas Kunstmuseum Den Haag Bequest Mr. and Mrs. G.L.F. Philips-van der Willigen, 1942, 0332453Between 1852 and 1870, Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte III tasked Georges-Eugène Haussmann—nicknamed "the demolisher"—with modernizing Paris. Although this decades-long construction project covered the city in a veil of dust and debris, Monet's three cityscapes seen here romanticize the beauty of modern Paris instead.The boulevard in the foreground was recently widened under Haussmann. This created the perfect arena for sunny promenades along the Seine and clear sightlines for old monuments—like the dome of the Panthéon (1758–1790)—to shine in the distance. On the left side of the painting is part of the Île de la Cité, the small island in the river where Haussmann transformed a dense slum into a picturesque area by driving out the majority of the island's poor population to the fringes of the city. Human figures in Monet's works are reduced to daubs of paint, signifying their movement through the transitional spaces of the grand boulevards flanking the Louvre and the Seine.
PICTURING PARIS: MONET AND THE MODERN CITY
Best known for his Waterlily series painted en "plein air" (or, outdoors), Claude Monet was one of the founding figures of the first Impressionist exposition in 1874. This exhibition, however, takes Monet's earlier cityscapes of Paris as its central focus. In 1867, the artist asked for special authorization to paint "views of Paris from the windows of the Louvre." Rather than copy the masterpieces inside the museum, as had generations of artists before him, Monet turned his view in the opposite direction—toward the city itself."Picturing Paris: Monet and the Modern City" brings together three of Monet's important cityscapes of Paris, all painted from an elevated viewpoint inside the Louvre: Oberlin College's "Garden of the Princess," Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin's "Saint Germain l'Auxerrois," and the Kunstmuseum in the "Hague's Quai du Louvre." These works are some of Monet's earliest renderings of the city, painted shortly after the opening of Paris's Exposition Universelle (World's Fair) of 1867; they attest to the city's importance as a growing modern metropolis.This exhibition is a partnership with the Alte Nationalgalerie in Berlin and the Kunstmuseum Den Haag.
Félix-Hilaire Buhot (French, 1847–1898)
Matinée d'hiver au quai de l'Hôtel-Dieu (Winter Morning at the Hôtel-Dieu Cabstand), 1876 Etching Allen Memorial Art Museum, 1900.27
