Musée d’Orsay exhibition recreates the birth of Impressionism

Dedicating a two-part exhibition to one historical event may seem superfluous, but the result, “Paris 1874: Inventing Impressionism,” is a revelation. In it, the Musée d’Orsay presents an exhibition about exhibitions—specifically, the first Impressionist exhibition that opened 150 years ago today and ushered in what we think of as modern art.

The central exhibition commemorating this defining moment features a virtual reality component, marking the first time that this immersive technology has been used so extensively to enhance the fine art experience. The parallel exhibition “Tonight and Impressionism” is held in a space adjacent to the main exhibition.

The physical exhibition (tickets are €32, about $35) will be on view until August 11 and will travel to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., in September (excluding the virtual reality portion). A total of 157 works are on display in the exhibition, 39 of which are from the Musée d’Orsay, 8 from the National Gallery of Art, and the rest from museums and private collections around the world.

The VR exhibition originated at the Orsay, with the aim of allowing visitors to relive the evening of April 15, 1874, when the first Impressionist exhibition opened at 8pm. “This is a very human moment,” Emmanuel Guerriero, head of immersive technology company Excurio, which co-produced the show with Gedeon Experiences, said of the historic night, “so we highlighted the human emotions.” VR shows.

There are no photos in the historical exhibition, which were hung by the artist himself. Therefore, “we launched a two-year investigation,” says Stéphane Millière, head of Gedeon Media Group.

Rose, a fictional 19th-century artist model and aspiring artist, leads visitors through a 40-minute virtual reality experience wearing a VR headset, reliving the opening ceremony in Paris.They also traveled to Bougival, west of Paris – a favorite haunt of struggling young artists whose calling card was painting. exist outdoor–as well as the cliffs of Etretat and other key locations where they worked or discussed their shared aesthetic mission.

This careful reconstruction considers land surveys, aerial photography of the neighborhood and studio, receipts and other documents, the original exhibition catalog (viewed in the exhibition case), letters written by the artist (which nourished the VR script), and commentary by contemporary journalists. It recreates the venue of the 1874 exhibition: the former Paris studio of photographer Gaspard-Felix Tourmachon (professionally known as Nadar), with its sumptuous crimson wall hangings and carpets, tall windows and interior waterfalls, and even its exterior, boasting Nadar ‘s name was chosen by red and gold lights.

According to Anne Robbins, co-curator of the Orsay exhibition, Nadar rented the building at 35 Avenue Capucine to the participating artists for 2,000 francs. In late 1873 these artists formed a cooperative, the Guild of Painters, Sculptors, Engravers and LithographersThe Paris Salon was an official venue overseen by the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, which rejected the reality of many salons in the late 1860s. What they long for is economic and artistic liberation. Rather than remain beholden to juries and art dealers, these frustrated renegades want to find their own audiences and customers.

The founding group consisted of 22 members, including now-famous names such as Claude Monet and Camille Pissarro. Robbins tells us that by the time it opened in April, its diverse and eclectic membership had grown to 31 people, each paying 60 francs for the four-week event. art news, and intended to enter two works each – although all submitted more works, about 200 in total. The exhibition, which opened 15 days before the Salon, attracted 3,500 paying visitors and garnered some 60 reviews.

“This was the first time the public was exposed to so many works known as ‘Impressionism,’” Milliere said. In fact, the term appeared just 10 days after the opening, when journalist Louis Leroy used it to mock the crude approach outlined by Claude Monet. impression, sunrise (1872) – The now-famous peach-colored sphere hovers over pale grey-blue water. The piece is placed in its own room in the Orsay installation, accompanying pastel sunrise and sunset paintings by Monet and his teacher Eugene Boudin.

The Orsay exhibition has made a huge effort to position the term Impressionism in context. “There’s a myth that this was a movement of scrappy avant-garde artists,” said Sylvie Patry, co-curator of the exhibition. Instead, “it began as a collaborative project of 31 people, not all of them Impressionist painters. Things were more subtle than that. Still, the proposal itself was bold. “Then the critic noted, [the artists]there’s something bold at the heart of it,” Patry noted.

Of course, the early timeline of the exhibition highlights the fact that many of the participating artists—Paul Cézanne, Alfred Sisley, Monet, Berthe Morisot, and Pierre-Auguste— · Renoir – born less than two years apart, between 1839 and 1841 (Pissarro and Edgar Degas were born in 1830 and 1834 respectively). But the common denominator for this modest group of artists was not a particular school or movement, but a desire to depict modern life; to reject class hierarchy; to capture the impression of a fleeting moment; and to introduce a new kind of painting The style includes loose, light, bold brushstrokes and vivid use of color.

This style would pave the way for other important artists and movements of the 20th century.But the very fact of this exhibition deserves special attention, transcending the Salon des Refusés of 1863 and defining itself outside any salon system: “This way [artists] Organizing itself is radical and revolutionary,” Patry said. “It’s surprisingly new and independent.”

The Orsay’s physical exhibition (like its virtual counterpart) pays close attention to the historical reality of 1874. The works in “Paris 1874” originate from the first Impressionist exhibition, the 91st Salon of that year, or later Impressionist exhibitions.

In the first room, titled “Ruins and Reconstruction,” the curators provide context for the artworks in the exhibition. Lithographs, including two by Édouard Manet (who refused to participate in the first Impressionist exhibition), depict the turmoil of the Siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, and the bloody rise and fall of the short-lived Paris Commune in 1871.

At the same time, as seen in works such as Louis-Émile Durandelle’s architectural photographs of the Opéra Garnier, the Industrial Revolution initiated by Baron Haussmann and recent urban renewal created New buildings, train stations and parks. The population has doubled and new lifestyle trends are taking hold. In short, as one of the exhibition wall texts states, by 1874 Paris was in the midst of a renaissance, filled with new businesses, luxury shops and entertainment venues.

The exhibition begins in the second room, where photographs of Nadar’s studio provide an introduction to some of the same works as when the original exhibition opened in 1874. They come from different locations and convey the shock of modern life.In Renoir’s work parisian (1874), from the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, depicts French actress Henriette Henriot, best known for her roles in the Théâtre de l’Odéon. Wearing stylish dresses and hats, she is the embodiment of the new Parisian woman.Next to her is Renoir’s dancer (1874), in which she wears a sheer blue-and-white tulle skirt and pink slippers, on loan from the National Gallery of Art in Washington.Monet’s street scene capucin avenue (1873-74), on loan from the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, depicts a horse-drawn carriage charging through a crowd.Renoir’s cabin (1874), now in the Courtauld Institute, London, depicts an affluent theater audience: he raises his opera glasses, she boldly surveys the crowd.

Further on, a gallery showcasing the conservative tastes of the wealthy Parisian salons from which the state purchased goods will soon open in the nearby Palais des Industrie et des Beaux-Arts. Here, history paintings and monumental biblical and mythological scenes sit alongside genre scenes, landscapes, and “Orientalist” works, many of which are on loan from private collections or institutions such as the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Each work was exhibited at the 91st Salon of 1874.

The Salon and Impressionist exhibitions of artists shared walls in subsequent rooms because, despite external competition between the two exhibitions, overlap was frequent. The latter part of the exhibition is devoted to paintings from five of the seven Impressionist exhibitions after 1874, when the exhibition was expanded to include the Pointillists Georges Seurat and Paul Signac and the emerging Symbolist Odilon Ray East.

Although Paris 1874 includes works by many lesser-known artists, the exhibition ends with a series of works now considered Impressionist masterpieces.The final gallery is filled with famous works such as Monet Saint Lazare Station (1877) with its steaming steam engine and named after Renoir’s Dancing at the Moulin de la Galette (1877), dappled with sunlight and shadow.

“Financially, it was not a success,” Robbins said of the 1874 show. “It was a failure.” Only a handful of paintings were sold: canvases by Sisley, Monet, Renoir and Cézanne. By the end of the year, the society was bankrupt. But this financial failure was a monumentally influential achievement that forever changed the direction of art history.

“We didn’t want to pay homage to the Impressionists, but rather to show a precise moment, the birth of a movement,” Patry said. Like the paintings it features, this exhibition focuses on a fleeting moment, but an important one nonetheless.