1. George Pierre Seurat (1859-91)
POSTIMPRESSIONISM
NEO-IMPRESSIONISM
CHROMO-
LUMINARISM
POINTILLISM
SCIENTIFIC
IMPRESSIONISM
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
2. What is
Pointillism?
• Technique of painting
(oil on canvas)
• Solid figures by using
tiny dots of colours
(pure & primary)
• Colours seem brighter
because not mixed on
the palette but by the
eye / mind (a distance
mix)
The Colour Wheel
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
Masters of P.:
P. Georges Seurat (1859-1891)
Paul Signac (1863-1935)
Charles Angrand (1854-1926)
Henry-Edmond Cross (1856-1910)
3. George Pierre Seurat (1859-91)
Born in Paris in 1859 .
Neo-Impressionism = aspects of
color theory + psychology of
perception to paint landscapes
and genre scenes.
Technique = chromoluminarism /
pointillism.
Away from the rapidity of
Impressionism monumental
art.
Sketches in the open air, then the
burlap completely painted in his
studio.
Modern life = scenes of leisure
and suburban life (bathers,
anglers and people
promenading).
G. Seurat, Bathers at Asniéres, 1883-’84. Oil
on Canvas, 201x300. London, National Gallery
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
Transitional work = modern
techniques + Impressionist theme
+ large size + classical
composition.
4. 1) art + science = Scientific Impressionism
”People say they see poetry in my
art. I see only science” (Seurat)
• In 1885-6 scientific
solution vs empirical
methods.
• Dots = the means to
control the qualities of
each color = optical
mixture blending in the
eye / mind without loosing
in intensity and
luminosity.
• The optimum distance = 3
x diagonal measurement
of any paintings.
G. Seurat, Honfleur, un soir, embouchure de
la Seine, 1886. Oil on canvas, 64,2×80 cm.
MoMA, New York
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
5. Eugene Chevreul and
the Colour Wheel
Laws of contrasting colors:
• the appearance of any c. can
be altered by changing the c.
beside it;
• no c. is purely visible by itself
and evokes something of its
opposite;
• any c. appears to be at its
most intense when placed
next to its complemetary (=
law of simultaneous
contrast)
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
6. Additive & Subtractive Colour Model
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
The CMYK color system is the color system
used for painting/printing
The RGB colors are light primaries and
colors are created with light.
8. G. P. Seurat, Un dimanche après-midi à l'Île de la Grande Jatte,
1883-’85. Oil on canvas, 207,6 x 308 cm. Chicago, Art Institute.
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
• people relaxing in a
suburban park;
• scientific technique;
• subject matter of
modern life, but
permanence*;
• commentary on the
posturing and
artificiality of
modern Parisian
society?
9. G. P. Seurat, Un dimanche après-midi à
l'Île de la Grande Jatte, 1883-’85. Oil on
canvas, 207,6 x 308 cm. Chicago, Art
Institute.
Plaque dite des Ergastines, fragment de
la frise est du Parthénon. Entre 445 et
438 avant J.-C. Trouvée au pied du
Parthénon, sur l'Acropole d'Athènes
Marbre du mont Pentélique, près
d'Athènes H.: 0,96 m. ; l.: 2,07 m. ; Pr.:
0,12 m.
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
* “The Panathenaeans of Phidias formed a procession. I want to make
modern people, in their essential traits, move about as they do on those
friezes, and place them on canvases organized by harmonies of color”.
(Seurat)
10. 2) HE AIMED AT RENOVATING
CLASSICISM
• Academic training (École des Beaux-Arts in Paris) +
Louvre (early Italian, 17th-century French artists,
classical statues).
• Modern techniques (Impressionism) + optical
theories of colour relationships
enduring art
in a classical style
with a modern subject
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
11. CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
At the beginning = drawings in black and white.
Later = out into the countryside to study colours, light
and landscape.
12. 3) SOCIAL AND MODERN LIFE
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
Unromantic vision of modern life
He admired Millet
Life of working people /working people
at leisure.
Aim = to analyze a social phenomenon;
to be modern, obtaining effects of
brilliance.
Jean-François Millet, The gleeners (1857); oil on
canvas, 83,5 × 110 cm, Musée d'Orsay
13. Close up:
Organizing Colour on Canvas
The paint dots on the
canvas
Above the dog
CLIL - Liceo "Agnesi" Milano Silvia Caldarini
Colour, which can be controlled by
fixed law, can be taught like music
(Charles Blanc)
Details
Notas del editor
This lesson will deal with the first P. trend: pointillism
I shall discuss about these keywords
They refer to different aspects:
Postimpressionism = Movement (coined in 1910 by Roger Fry)
Neo-Impressionism = style. Term coined by Seurat
C-L and Pointillism = technique to depict light and shapes
Scientific-Impressionism = approach
This complex painting technique recreated something of the impression of vibrations produced by sunlight
George Pierre Seurat was born in 1859 in Paris.
S. Is credited with the invention of Neo-Impressionism = he attempted to apply aspects of color theory and the psychology of perception to his landscapes and genre scenes.
The technique is known as chromoluminarism and pointillism to depict light and shapes.
He moved away from the rapidity of Impressionism and developed a structured, monumental art, to depict modern urban life.
He made sketches in the open air, in order then to paint the burlap (= rough cloth= iuta) completely in his studio.
Subjects: he painted scenes of leisure and suburban life including bathers, anglers and people promenading.
Angler = pescatore
Bathers at Asnières = transitional work, where modern techniques are used to represent the typical Impressionist theme in a large size and classical composition. The jury of the 1884 Salon refused it!
Seurat's artistic personality was compounded of qualities which are usually supposed to be opposed and incompàtible: on the one hand, his extreme and delicate sensibility; on the other, a passion for logical abstraction and an almost mathematical precision of mind.
Seurat studied how colours interact each other, developing his technique in 1885-6.
During this period he was attracted by the scenes of the harbor, but he said: ”People say they see poetry in my art. I see only science”
He united art and science creating a style which he called SCIENTIFIC IMPRESSIONISM. This technique was thought as the means to translate the effects of light and colour in nature, and as a scientific solution to the problem of colour and vision, of representing light and colours in contrast with the solutions adopted by Monet and the Impressionists (the empirical methods).
The dot (= point of color) was the means that seemed best able to control the qualities of each color.
Seurat and his contemporaries stated that these dots were meant to reproduce an optical mixture of colors blending in the eye (or rather in the mind) without loosing in intensity and luminosity. This is not exactly what takes place, because these points are not small enough to fuse and to reproduce a single color, BUT this complex technique aimed at recreated something of the impression of vibrations (shimmering effects) produced by sunlight.
The painter stated that the optimum distance was three times the diagonal measurement of any paintings (but the effect of the canvas is that the dots remain clearly visible as dots).
I’ll give a summary of / summarize …
He studied the laws of Chevreul regarding contrasting colors: he supported in fact that no color is purely visible by himself and it evokes something of its opposite. (= law of simultaneous contrast). E.g. red is the opposite of green
WORQX: DESIGN, RESOURCES AND TUTORIALS – COLOUR: http://www.worqx.com/color/color_basics.htm
Additive color is a method to create color by mixing different light colors
A subtractive color model explains the mixing of a set of paint pigments to create a wider range of colors
The HSB scheme. Three main characteristics can define color:
1. the hue is the color itself in its different variations.
2. the saturation is the purity of the colour. It refers to the amount of color that distances it from the gray = the s. is the intensity, or level of chroma, of a color. The more gray a color has in it, the less chroma it has.
3. the brightness refers to the amount of black or white in the color. = luminosity. (for instance: when brightness increases saturation decreases)
In his best-known and largest painting, Georges Seurat depicted people relaxing in a suburban park on an island in the Seine River called La Grande Jatte.
Before listening to the video I’d like you to consider some aspects.
The subject: he focuses his attention on street life images and on indoor scenes as well.
He wanted to be modern, obtaining effects of brilliance.
He wanted to analyze a mood, a social phenomenon.
The artist worked on the painting in several campaigns, beginning in 1884 with a layer (= something that covers a surface, or something that is between two things) of small horizontal brushstrokes of complementary colors. He later added small dots, also in complementary colors, that appear as solid and luminous forms when seen from a distance. Seurat’s use of this highly systematic and "scientific" technique, subsequently called Pointillism, distinguished his art from the more intuitive approach to painting used by the Impressionists.
Although Seurat embraced the subject matter of modern life preferred by artists such as Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, he went beyond their concern for capturing the accidental and instantaneous qualities of light in nature. Seurat sought to evoke permanence by recalling the art of the past, especially Egyptian and Greek sculpture and even Italian Renaissance frescoes.
As he explained to the French poet Gustave Kahn, "The Panathenaeans of Phidias formed a procession. I want to make modern people, in their essential traits, move about as they do on those friezes, and place them on canvases organized by harmonies of color."
Some contemporary critics, however, found his figures to be less a nod to (= allusion) earlier art history than a commentary on the posturing and artificiality of modern Parisian society.
Seurat made the final changes to La Grande Jatte in 1889. He restretched the canvas in order to add a painted border of red, orange, and blue dots that provides a visual transition between the interior of the painting and his specially designed white frame.
In his best-known and largest painting, Georges Seurat depicted people relaxing in a suburban park on an island in the Seine River called La Grande Jatte.
Before listening to the video I’d like you to consider some aspects.
The subject: he focuses his attention on street life images and on indoor scenes as well.
He wanted to be modern, obtaining effects of brilliance.
He wanted to analyze a mood, a social phenomenon.
The artist worked on the painting in several campaigns, beginning in 1884 with a layer (= something that covers a surface, or something that is between two things) of small horizontal brushstrokes of complementary colors. He later added small dots, also in complementary colors, that appear as solid and luminous forms when seen from a distance. Seurat’s use of this highly systematic and "scientific" technique, subsequently called Pointillism, distinguished his art from the more intuitive approach to painting used by the Impressionists.
Although Seurat embraced the subject matter of modern life preferred by artists such as Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir, he went beyond their concern for capturing the accidental and instantaneous qualities of light in nature. Seurat sought to evoke permanence by recalling the art of the past, especially Egyptian and Greek sculpture and even Italian Renaissance frescoes.
As he explained to the French poet Gustave Kahn, "The Panathenaeans of Phidias formed a procession. I want to make modern people, in their essential traits, move about as they do on those friezes, and place them on canvases organized by harmonies of color."
Seurat made the final changes to La Grande Jatte in 1889. He restretched the canvas in order to add a painted border of red, orange, and blue dots that provides a visual transition between the interior of the painting and his specially designed white frame.
Academic training: at the age of 17 he was taught to paint by a pupil of Ingres, Henri Lehman, at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris + in the Louvre he studied early Italian and 17th-century French artists and the classical statues as well.
He admired Piero della Francesca (intellectual precision and equilibrium ), Pisano and Ghiberti (dramatic atmosphere) and Poussin (classicism in landscape).
He copied the Parthenon friezes and those of Egypt, admiring their idealization (representation in profile and for flat forms).
He studied modern techniques (Impressionism) and applied optical theories of colour relationships.
enduring art (and not impression) in a classical style, with a modern subject.
Art, for him, is not in what we see, but in how we see.
Preparatory studies, for up to a year, before the final painting
His drawings in black and white are particularly concerned with light and three-dimensional forms: Light creates depth, roundness
light comes from a precise source and seems to come out of the paper.
Some contemporary critics, however, found his figures to be less a nod to (= allusion) earlier art history than a commentary on the posturing and artificiality of modern Parisian society.
Unromantic vision of modern life / loneliness = the main element of reality.
He visited Fontainbleu and the village of Barbizon. He admired Millet = profound understanding of the dignity of labour (= solid figures and classicism in landscape) together with his mastery of drawing.
Topics = Life of working people /working people at leisure. Street life images and indoor scenes as well
Style = enduring life and no impressions. Art, for him, is not in what we see, but in how we see.
Aim = to analyze a mood, a social phenomenon. He wanted to be modern, obtaining effects of brilliance.
The only spontaneous figures in the painting are the children playing, the animals (dogs and a monkey at a leash) and the man lying (reclining) on the grass with his naked arms
