American Impressionism
Encyclopedia
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
, a style of painting characterized by loose brushwork and vivid colors, was practiced widely among American artists in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
An emerging artistic style from Paris
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
emerged as an artistic style in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
in the 1860s. Major exhibitions of French impressionist works in Boston and New York in the 1880s introduced the style to the American public. Some of the first American artists to paint in an impressionistic mode, such as Theodore Robinson
Theodore Robinson
Theodore Robinson was an American painter best known for his impressionist landscapes. He was one of the first American artists to take up impressionism in the late 1880s, visiting Giverny and developing a close friendship with Claude Monet...
, did so in the late 1880s after visiting France and meeting with artists such as Claude Monet
Claude Monet
Claude Monet was a founder of French impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. . Retrieved 6 January 2007...
. Others, such as Childe Hassam
Childe Hassam
Frederick Childe Hassam was a prolific American Impressionist painter, noted for his urban and coastal scenes. Along with Mary Cassatt and John Henry Twachtman, Hassam was instrumental in promulgating Impressionism to American collectors, dealers, and museums...
, took notice of the increasing numbers of French impressionist works at American exhibitions.
Trailblazers from the turn of the 20th century
From the 1890s through the 1910s, American impressionism flourished in art coloniesArt colony
right|300px|thumb|Artist houses in [[Montsalvat]] near [[Melbourne, Australia]].An art colony or artists' colony is a place where creative practitioners live and interact with one another. Artists are often invited or selected through a formal process, for a residency from a few weeks to over a year...
—loosely affiliated groups of artists who lived and worked together and shared a common aesthetic vision. Art colonies tended to form in small towns that provided affordable living, abundant scenery for painting, and relatively easy access to large cities where artists could sell their work. Some of the most important American impressionist artists gathered at Cos Cob
Cos Cob Art Colony
The Cos Cob Art Colony was a group of artists, many of them American Impressionists, who gathered in and around Cos Cob, a section of Greenwich, Connecticut, from about 1890 to about 1920....
and Old Lyme, Connecticut
Old Lyme, Connecticut
Old Lyme is a town in New London County, Connecticut, United States. The Main Street of the town is a historic district. The town has long been a popular summer resort and artists' colony...
, both on Long Island Sound
Long Island Sound
Long Island Sound is an estuary of the Atlantic Ocean, located in the United States between Connecticut to the north and Long Island, New York to the south. The mouth of the Connecticut River at Old Saybrook, Connecticut, empties into the sound. On its western end the sound is bounded by the Bronx...
; New Hope, Pennsylvania
New Hope, Pennsylvania
New Hope, formerly known as Coryell's Ferry, is a borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, USA. The population was 2,528 at the 2010 census. The borough lies on the west bank of the Delaware River at its confluence with Aquetong Creek. A two-lane bridge carries automobile and foot traffic across the...
, on the Delaware River; and Brown County, Indiana
Brown County, Indiana
Brown County is a county located in the U.S. state of Indiana. As of 2010, the population is 15,242. The county seat is Nashville.- History :...
. American impressionist artists also thrived in California at Carmel
Carmel-by-the-Sea, California
Carmel-by-the-Sea, often called simply Carmel, is a small city in Monterey County, California, United States, founded in 1902 and incorporated in 1916. Situated on the Monterey Peninsula, the town is known for its natural scenery and rich artistic history...
and Laguna Beach
Laguna Beach, California
Laguna Beach is a seaside resort city and artist community located in southern Orange County, California, United States, approximately southwest of the county seat of Santa Ana...
; in New York on eastern Long Island
Long Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
at Shinnecock, largely due to the influence of William Merritt Chase
William Merritt Chase
William Merritt Chase was an American painter known as an exponent of Impressionism and as a teacher. He is also responsible for establishing the Chase School, which later would become Parsons The New School for Design.- Early life and training :He was born in Williamsburg , Indiana, to the family...
; and in Boston where Edmund Charles Tarbell and Frank Weston Benson
Frank Weston Benson
Frank Weston Benson, frequently referred to as Frank W. Benson, was an American artist from Salem, Massachusetts known for his Realistic portraits, American Impressionist paintings, watercolors and etchings. He began his career painting portraits of distinguished families and murals for the...
became important practitioners of the impressionist style.
Jazz age artists' colonies fizzled
Some American art colonies remained vibrant centers of impressionist art into the 1920s. However, impressionism in America lost its cutting-edge status in 1913 when a historical exhibition of modern art took place at the 69th Regiment Armory building in New York City. The “Armory ShowArmory Show
Many exhibitions have been held in the vast spaces of U.S. National Guard armories, but the Armory Show refers to the 1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art that was organized by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors...
”, as it came to be called, heralded a new painting style regarded as more in touch with the increasingly fast-paced and chaotic world, especially with the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. The Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
and World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
The rebirth of impressionism in America: The 1950s and beyond
In the 1950s, a quarter of a century after the death of Monet, major museums in America started having exhibitions of the original French Impressionists paintings, and in so doing Impressionism was reborn. The resurgence of interest in Impressionism continues to this day, and is especially evident in the continued popularity of plein-air painting.Notable American impressionists
Prominent impressionistImpressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
painters, from the United States include:
See also
- ImpressionismImpressionismImpressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
- Pennsylvania ImpressionismPennsylvania ImpressionismPennsylvania Impressionism refers to an American Impressionist movement from the first half of the 20th century that was centered in and around Bucks County, Pennsylvania, particularly the area around the town of New Hope...
- Hoosier GroupHoosier GroupThe Hoosier Group was a group of Indiana Impressionist painters working in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They are primarily known for their renditions of the Indiana landscape. Artists considered members of this group include T. C. Steele, Richard Gruelle, William Forsyth, J. Ottis...
- Richmond GroupRichmond GroupThe Richmond Group also known as the Richmond School, is a group of American Impressionist painters who worked in the Richmond, Indiana area from the late 19th Century through the mid-20th Century...