Monet 2Impressionists

Impressionism

Monet, like other impressionist painters of the time prefered to paint outdoors.He was interested in capturing the effect of outdoor light,the weather, and atmospheric conditions. He painted in all seasons.

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. He travelled throughout France,especially to the coastline of Normandy,Brittany,and the Mediteranean,concentrating on painting rivers and the sea,done on canvas primed with white which helped create luminosity of colour. We also see the use of flat brushstrokes to express movement of water. All through these years he suffered severe financial difficulties as his paintings were refused by the salon and it was extremely difficult to sell them. In1879 he wrote "I am absolutely sickened with and demoralized by this life Ive been leading for so long"
All through these years his colours became brighter. Instead of using brown and black in the shadows he began to use blue. To convey greenery he began to use various shades of colour from blue, through green, to yellow,instead of using tonal chiarscuro modelling. The whole impressionist movement got its name from an ironic critics comment on a painting by Monet called "Impressipns Soleil le Vent which was exhibited at an alternative salon exhibition. This was participated in by his painter friends Renoir, Degas, Pissaro, Sisley and Cezanne.

Due to financial hardship and family problems he was forced to move away from his Parisienne friends and he setteled further down the Seine. He worked Independantly from now on. But one major influence on his work was Japanese prints, notably the use of flat planes of colour positioned behind one another,to convey a sense of distance. Another development in his work was his use of versatile brushstrokes, sometimes using the brush like a pen to create long flowing lines, on other ocasions using short flat brush strokes which were not blended in with the surrounding colour. His work became more two dimensional. During this period he began to finish paintings indoors because of pressure from his dealer, because they would sell better. His dealer started to sell paintings to the American public so his finances improved greatly.