Turner Whistler Monet
Sep. 11th, 2004 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vaneramosI was very fortunate yesterday to spend an hour perusing Turner Whistler Monet: Impressionist Visions, an exclusive North American exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario. I nearly missed the show with my busy summer schedule. I saw a notice about it last month and made a mental note to see it this week, but would have forgotten if I hadn't picked up a newspaper in Toronto yesterday afternoon. I sped over the the art gallery for a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see works from my two favourite painters, Turner and Monet. I was less familiar with Whistler, so it was interesting to see how these three 19th Century artists related to one another. The relationship was profound.
The exhibit featured 100 landscape paintings. The first two or three rooms highlighted the career of the earliest artist, John Turner. His paintings showed a dramatic transition from high detail and realism to canvasses showing little more than dramatic light effects. He explored the technique of painting directly into the sun, so that features of the landscape were washed in an ethereal glow. In some cases mist and light practically obscured all form. Thus was born Impressionism, perhaps the most popular of all movements in visual art. Turner also initiated watercolour as an important medium.
The next stage of the exhibit moved forward several decades to compare some of James McNeill Whistler's and Claude Monet's paintings of the Thames in London. All three artists were fascinated with the Thames and the peculiar fog, which created remarkable atmospheric effects. This was one of the primary focuses of the exhibit. Turner and Whistler were particularly interested in nighttime scenes, as in Turner's Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons. Whistler painted a huge series over many years entitled Nocturnes, always studies in two colours.
He not only revealed the seedier side of London, but clearly depicted its air pollution, dereliction and marks of industrialism; for example, Nocturne in Blue and Gold: Old Battersea Bridge. His works demonstrate the beginnings of environmental awareness. However, he deliberately chose to portray the beauty of everday life.
One of the most interesting paintings in this series was his Nocturne in Black and Gold: The Falling Rocket, which the critic John Ruskin firmly criticized. I was surprised that Ruskin, who defended Turner a few years earlier, had no use for Whistler. Neither, apparently, did Oscar Wilde. While looking for the image of the painting online, I learned that Wilde's fairytale, The Remarkable Rocket, probably referred to this painting. He considered Whistler the vainest man he knew.
Whistler and Monet knew one another, and their paintings of the Thames show cross-references. Monet lived in exile in London in about 1870 to avoid fighting in the Franco-Prussian War. The Thames Below Westminster dates from that time. However he was apparently deterred by Whistler's mastery of the subject. After a few paintings he did not return to it until much later in life, after Whistler had obviously finished with it.
Back in France he painted a series entitled Branch of the Seine near Giverny. One room of the exhibit was devoted to three of these, showing an identical scene in slightly different atmospheric conditions. He would rise at 3 a.m. to paint them. These were my favourites for their subtlety, his exploration of the qualities of light, which fascinates me, the love of nature I can see through his eyes, and the landscape itself, which reminds me of the Eramosa River.
Monet finally returned to London several times around 1900 because his son lived there. He completed a large number of paintings at that time. These were strikingly different from the earlier ones, and those of Turner and Whistler. See Houses of Parliament in London As Seen From the Thames River, a subject he painted repeatedly, again in different qualities of light. By then his unique vision was fully realized.
Another subject that all three artists painted was the lagoon in Venice. The final room of the exhibit was given to this subject, with Monet's stunning Sainte-Georges Majeur at Dusk in a prominent position before the exit. Few painters could put so much colour on a canvas without it seeming gratuitous. His facility with colour is one of the qualities I like about Monet's work, though I also admired the more modest palette of his Seine paintings. The recorded commentary pointed out that Venice was an important industrial city at the turn of the century. With coal dust in the air, Monet's sunset was probably no exaggeration.
Rushing through this exhibit on its final Friday, I had to contend with staggering crowds, which prevented me from approaching a few of the paintings. The press seemed to thin out towards the end, so I got a closer look at the Monet pieces I liked the best. I wish I had planned my visit better to allow longer time during a quieter part of the day, when I could reflect more on what I was seeing (and hearing from the audio guide). But I am simply pleased to have seen it at all and learned a little from three of history's greatest landscape masters.
The exhibit featured 100 landscape paintings. The first two or three rooms highlighted the career of the earliest artist, John Turner. His paintings showed a dramatic transition from high detail and realism to canvasses showing little more than dramatic light effects. He explored the technique of painting directly into the sun, so that features of the landscape were washed in an ethereal glow. In some cases mist and light practically obscured all form. Thus was born Impressionism, perhaps the most popular of all movements in visual art. Turner also initiated watercolour as an important medium.
The next stage of the exhibit moved forward several decades to compare some of James McNeill Whistler's and Claude Monet's paintings of the Thames in London. All three artists were fascinated with the Thames and the peculiar fog, which created remarkable atmospheric effects. This was one of the primary focuses of the exhibit. Turner and Whistler were particularly interested in nighttime scenes, as in Turner's Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons. Whistler painted a huge series over many years entitled Nocturnes, always studies in two colours.
He not only revealed the seedier side of London, but clearly depicted its air pollution, dereliction and marks of industrialism; for example, Nocturne in Blue and Gold: Old Battersea Bridge. His works demonstrate the beginnings of environmental awareness. However, he deliberately chose to portray the beauty of everday life.
One of the most interesting paintings in this series was his Nocturne in Black and Gold: The Falling Rocket, which the critic John Ruskin firmly criticized. I was surprised that Ruskin, who defended Turner a few years earlier, had no use for Whistler. Neither, apparently, did Oscar Wilde. While looking for the image of the painting online, I learned that Wilde's fairytale, The Remarkable Rocket, probably referred to this painting. He considered Whistler the vainest man he knew.
Whistler and Monet knew one another, and their paintings of the Thames show cross-references. Monet lived in exile in London in about 1870 to avoid fighting in the Franco-Prussian War. The Thames Below Westminster dates from that time. However he was apparently deterred by Whistler's mastery of the subject. After a few paintings he did not return to it until much later in life, after Whistler had obviously finished with it.
Back in France he painted a series entitled Branch of the Seine near Giverny. One room of the exhibit was devoted to three of these, showing an identical scene in slightly different atmospheric conditions. He would rise at 3 a.m. to paint them. These were my favourites for their subtlety, his exploration of the qualities of light, which fascinates me, the love of nature I can see through his eyes, and the landscape itself, which reminds me of the Eramosa River.
Monet finally returned to London several times around 1900 because his son lived there. He completed a large number of paintings at that time. These were strikingly different from the earlier ones, and those of Turner and Whistler. See Houses of Parliament in London As Seen From the Thames River, a subject he painted repeatedly, again in different qualities of light. By then his unique vision was fully realized.
Another subject that all three artists painted was the lagoon in Venice. The final room of the exhibit was given to this subject, with Monet's stunning Sainte-Georges Majeur at Dusk in a prominent position before the exit. Few painters could put so much colour on a canvas without it seeming gratuitous. His facility with colour is one of the qualities I like about Monet's work, though I also admired the more modest palette of his Seine paintings. The recorded commentary pointed out that Venice was an important industrial city at the turn of the century. With coal dust in the air, Monet's sunset was probably no exaggeration.
Rushing through this exhibit on its final Friday, I had to contend with staggering crowds, which prevented me from approaching a few of the paintings. The press seemed to thin out towards the end, so I got a closer look at the Monet pieces I liked the best. I wish I had planned my visit better to allow longer time during a quieter part of the day, when I could reflect more on what I was seeing (and hearing from the audio guide). But I am simply pleased to have seen it at all and learned a little from three of history's greatest landscape masters.
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-11 09:02 pm (UTC)looked at those three much for years and
years. i didn't really know how intertwined
their painting was. ~paul
no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 12:48 am (UTC)"If the world really looks like that I will paint no more!"
Date: 2004-09-12 05:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 07:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 07:12 am (UTC)Incidentally, one of my favourite books, Cultivating Sacred Space by Elizabeth Murray, includes a passage with several photographs about Monet's water-lily garden at Giverny, featured in some of his most famous paintings. The paintings of the Seine were a lot subtler and even more peaceful.
Re: "If the world really looks like that I will paint no more!"
Date: 2004-09-12 07:21 am (UTC)Coincidentally, another LJ friend posted Oscar Wilde's preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray in his journal this week. Contemplation of those words was an excellent accompaniment for my visit to the AGO. I'll quote two lines here:
The nineteenth-century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.
The nineteenth-century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 07:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 07:50 am (UTC)I hope it was a good one. ;-)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 07:52 am (UTC)And it was indeed nice to see you the other day!
:-)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 08:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 08:07 am (UTC):-)
realism vs. impressionism
Date: 2004-09-12 06:32 pm (UTC)Re: realism vs. impressionism
Date: 2004-09-12 06:49 pm (UTC)Re: realism vs. impressionism
Date: 2004-09-12 07:06 pm (UTC)Re: realism vs. impressionism
Date: 2004-09-12 07:09 pm (UTC)