Customer Reviews

The Private Lives of the Impressionists

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One common lack in the multitude of books on the French Impressionist painters is that most books concentrate on the individual artists, or at least on one artist at a time, and do little to connect the artists in the context of their private lives. A few concentrate on correspondence between artists, but don't draw it all together. There have been some notable exceptions (such as Rewald's almost encyclopedic "The History of Impressionism"), but I think that for a relatively short intimate and interconnected history of the Impressionists Sue Roe's "The Private lives of the Impressionists" stands out. I was literally caught up in the story from the start (even though I have read several other versions) and learned a great deal about who knew who when and how various painters influenced others in the movement. Here Manet grumbles about his confusion with a new painter- Monet. Cezanne wonders in an out of the group, always apparently angry and paranoid. Monet is chased by creditors and has difficulties with his parents over his mistress, a problem also for several other male Impressionists. Berthe Marisot is alternately wooed and rejected by Manet (despite his own commitments). Pissarro extols his socialist ideas and various important painters- Degas, Bazille, Courbet, Caillebotte, Cassatt, Renoir, Sisley, Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Marisot, Cezanne and others work together, get angry with each other, fight for recognition and daily bread, and have romances (or not in the case of Bazille). Indeed we see them as real people, not geniuses, with real problems.

The Impressionists made up a varied lot, who's main bond was painting, but who ran from rich to poor, socialist to conservative, and shy to outrageous. However, they completely changed Western art during their lives and difficulties, including the numerous rejections by the established art community. In addition most had to each deal in their own way with the deadly Franco-Prussian War and resultant revolt of the Communards.

If you want to read the unvarnished overview of the artists who altered the history of art in France during the last half of the Nineteenth Century, without having it encyclopedic in size, this would be it!

This is the story of one of the great movements in Art History, French Impressionism. It does not however focus on the Art itself, but rather on the lives of the artists, on their relations to each other, on the story of the time and world in which they lived. It tells a story of a great deal of rejection at home where the Impressionists work was frequently jeered, and concludes with the tale of the immense success the great agent and promoter Rurand- Duel had in New York in his exhibition of 1880 a success which truly put the Impressionists on the road to success. In the twenty odd years from 1860 roughly to 1880 in which Manet, Pisarro, Monet, Renoir, Sisley, Bazille, Cezanne, Degas, Morisot, Cassatt, truly create Impressionism most of this group could not make a living from their painting.
One of the most surprising and moving features of this story is how these painters tried to help each other, were very often true friends to one another. Here the model and example was Pisarro whose kindness and generosity seemed to come natural.
A number of the Impressionists had for a long time their parents as principal patrons. And this book traces the often complicated family relationships involved .Also the love - relationships, or lack of love relationships in the lives of the artist are tastefully recorded.
The most moving chapter of the book tells of what finally happened to each of the artists after they grew apart from each other.
To my mind the major failing of the work is that it does not really give a sense of the painting, nor show how each artist developed his own unique way of seeing the world.

I read this book because I have recently been viewing alot of Impressionistic art and I thought I needed some stories about the artists to make their work more memorable. The title made me think I was going to read alot of gossip and scandal, but after 100 years their tales hardly seem that flagrant. The major themes of their private lives seems to have been hard work, disappointment and penury. (Caillebotte and Cassett were the exceptions, as they were from wealthy families.) The author's style most resembles a professional biographer- not a gossip columnist. However, I did get a feeling for the personalities of some of the major Impressionists. Their relationships with each other are especially well recorded because they all knew one another and sometimes worked together.

If you are unfamiliar with this art, I would not recommend the book. The reproductions are small and few. And, there is no prose capable of capturing the beauty of Impressionism. However, Roe's book is a useful adjunct to an art centered study of the period.

It is satisfying to note that Impressionism continues to grow in the estimation of both critics and the public. It was the first French art to combine pedestrian life with a nebulous , colorful technique. Viewed from this century, it has the added attraction of being the last period wherein subject matter was as important as style and whose artists demonstrated verifiable talent. Ultimately, one's understanding of Impressionism can only proceed so far. To wit: on the day Renoir died, he reluctantly yielded his brush saying, "I think I am beginning to learn something about it."

Paris began the nineteenth century as an ancient city of winding streets, dark alleys and dankly dangerous ill lit streets. Due to the architectural genius of Baron Haussman, Prefect of the Seine,it was transformed into the City of Light. The Eiffel Tower! The well lighted boulevards, the enchanting and cool parks, the height of fashion and the charm of beautifully sculpted public buildings made it the apex of urban beauty (although appalling poverty did still exist). Even the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71 when Paris was briefly occupied by Prussian soldiers did not dispel the charm of this world capital.
In mid nineteenth century Paris art seemed locked in a Procrustean bed of classicicism and stody history painting. The French Academy would only show painting approved by its ultra-conservative directors.
Each year bold new artists were seeking to make impressionism the wave of the future. Each year their art was rejected at Academy shows. Each year masterpieces were created as they launched their own art shows to intially hostile and then adoring crowds flocking to see them. Who were these artist beginning the most popular movement in art history?
Among their number were:
Eduard Manet the oldest of the impressionists whose bold colors and views of sea and the life of evereyday Parisians was a bold step in the art world. His painting "A Modern Olympia" picturing a nude prostitute as well as other controversial works such as "Le Dejeuner
sur l'herbe" of 1863 portraying a nude women sitting with two fully clothed male friends was a cause celebre bringing attention to the new trend of budding artists seekiing to portray light, color and air as they caught the "impression" of the evanescent passing scene.
Claude Monet (1840-1926) noted for his water lilies, boating scenes and haystacks at his home in Giverny had to struggle against his family, saw children die and faced years of poverty would, nevertheless, triumph becoming rich and famous. His 1872 painting "Impression: Dawn" gave the word impressionism to the movement he and his friends were launching.
Auguste Renoir (1841-1917) was famed for his portraits, love of abundance feminine nudes and boating and fruit scenes.Like many of the impressionist
his family opposed his painting and his choice of a simple girl as a bride.
Camille Pissaro (1840-1903) was born to a Spanish Jewish family in the West Indies. Pissaro served as a mentor to many of the impressionists.
Edgar Degas (1832-1883) died young of syphillis. The French artist Berthe Morisot married his brother Gustave. She may have been in love with Edgar.
His art is noted for brilliant persective, color and beauty.
Several other leading impressionists are discussed such as the American Philadelphian Mary Cassat: Paul Cezzane (who grew up as a friend of the famed novelist Emile Zola) are profiled.
The group eventually broke up showing ther art in shows with one another but by then the art world had been revolutionized by their genius.
Sue Roe has penned a fascinating study of the impressionists. She shows the mileu of Paris and France at the time they lived; how they interacted; how they loved, supported one another and at times feuded with not only the critics but themselves.
Anyone who strolls through an art gallery wanting to know more about the lives of the artists would enjoy this delightful book.

This book is really great if you LOVE art history classes. I thought it was going to discuss relationships with other artists and their families. It's very "time line" oriented: you know, first this happened, then this happened, next this happened...etc. I thought it would be more from their letters and let us delve into these fascinating artists' lives and relationships. Instead, It's very clinical.

One of the great benefits of living where I do is the opportunity to take in great art. A reasonably short train trip lands me in Manhattan and I'm able to go and gaze at the glories of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. One of the huge draws of the Met are the galleries of paintings by the artists of nineteenth century France and the movement known as Impressionism. Filled with light and colour, these paintings caused mockery from the critics, outrage, and yet were still able to find a market -- and one that has become even more so in the modern world, where Impressionist paintings fetch prices in the millions of dollars.

In this narrative group biography, author Sue Roe explores the lives of the leaders of the Impressionist movement from 1862 to 1886, the most troubled -- and most prolific -- years that these artists shook up the rather staid art world. Each artist is given a bit of a brief biography, and some of the details of their childhood and early careers, along with the women they married and their struggles for either money or recognition or both.

She begins, naturally enough, with Edouard Manet, and his painting, Le Dejeneur sur l'Herbe first exhibited in the Paris Salon in 1863, and which caused outrage. It wasn't a biblical or historical subject, or a portrait, or even a landscape. Instead, two modern Parisian men are sitting out of doors on the grass, with a naked woman. And she's being bold about it, staring out at the viewer with a frank and somewhat amused expression. His next painting, Olympia, had the same naked model, this time as a grand courtesan in a modern setting, and this time, the critics really screamed in horror. Other artists were pushing the limits with experimental work that played with light, such as Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, Edgar Degas, Auguste Renoir and Paul Cézanne. Two women would join the Impressionist circle, Berthe Morisot (she would marry Manet's brother in time) and Mary Cassatt. Shunned by the judges of the Paris Salon, they would eventually stage their own exhibitions, with varied success.

What makes this one different is that Roe takes a look at the lives of these people outside of the art. She looks at how they met one another, their marriages and children, how the outside world treated them. Most of her attention is focused on their financial and marital world. The popular idea of an artist struggling and slowly starving in a garret, fighting the world that scorns them, probably grew out of these lives, if Roe's information is any indication. With a few exceptions, nearly every artist in this story is going broke in a big way -- there are vivid details of their private lives, the quiet frustrations of their wives trying to raise their children on nearly nothing, and especially the choice that some of them took to paint more popular paintings that would make them money, and so, survive.

It was this constant focus on the lack money and the descriptions of poverty that really struck me with this nonfiction work. Again and again Roe focuses on the subject, and seems to take delight in describing the misery, from the Franco-Prussian War and the Communard uprising that soon followed, the disputes that Cézanne and his father had over money, and the constant borrowing and pleading for cash. What with all of the whinging going on, I wonder how anyone had time to paint...

And that's the disappointment of this work. The narrative has a very gossipy tone, and Roe continually focuses on the negative aspects of life. After a while, it became rather tedious to read about, and combined with the fact that she had so many leading characters necessarily leads to everyone getting a little piece of the story, and not too much lead time. I came away with a good perspective and idea of the time range of the Impressionist movement, but I also came away with not really knowing a great deal about any of the artists. If I had not already read some fictional and nonfiction works about Manet, Morisot and Cassatt, I would be heartily confused. Too, Roe mentions various paintings and works, but then doesn't have any pictures of them in the two photographic inserts. It all comes across as very confusing in the end, and while the book does have some positive aspects, it's not one that I would recommend for casual reading.

If the reader already has some knowledge of the Impressionists, this would be a good gateway book to spur some interest in more specific artists, but it really doesn't reveal anything new. Along with the two inserts of paintings, small black and white pictures are at the start of each section, along with two maps showing Paris and the surrounding countryside during the period. Plenty of notes and a bibliography and index complete the book.

Overall, this is about a three-four star read. It's worth reading once, but it's also one that I don't think I will reread any time soon. Which is a pity. So this is not a book that I would recommend, despite giving it an overall rating of four stars.

While most art history books provide a wide sweep of the historical epoch of Impressionism, this book is different. We are allowed to peer into the private lives of the individual artists who were part of this dynamic new movement in art. We are witness to the difficulties that vexed most of these artists, not the least being lack of money and recognition. We also learn that while all of these artists remained friends, they were not as homogenous a group as one would think. After the 1870s, only Monet remained true to the movement while the others moved in new directions in their art or, in some cases, returned to the classical. All in all the book is worth reading for the intimate protraits of these now very famous people.

I recommend this book to those interested in adding to their knowledge of the context out of which Impressionism arose. It does a very good job of showing the links between the personalities that were the progenitors of the movement, and describes their relationships, their lifestyles, their rivalries, and their interdependence (financial and otherwise). As another reviewer here notes, most of us think of individual artists separately while this book presents us with something like a "family" perspective (complete with dysfunctions).

There are some puzzling errors in the book that, for me, occasionally interrupted the flow of the story: most are not substantive (the piano maker Pleyel has an extra letter added to his name; a journal is variously referred to in a single chapter as Le Jour et la nuit, Le Jour et La nuit, and Le Jour et La Nuit), but some are (on consecutive pages the same person is described as having died in 1870 and 1874). Perhaps these are only typesetting mistakes; they do not detract from the value of the book.

I got the book a little late, but I'm very happy with the condition of the book. It's also a great read if you are interested in art, especially Impressionism. Roe writes informally, it isn't academic in anyway, but guides you through the intertwining lives of the founding Impressionist artists. She offers funny and interesting tales that tell us a lot about 19 century France as well as the personalities of each painter. I enjoyed it very much!

Early this year I went to see a show at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, Birth of Impressionism. I enjoyed the show, found this book in the museum shop, came home and ordered in on Amazon, read it and couldn't wait to go back and look at the paintings again. Wow, what a difference! The whole thing came to life for me. I got the catalog Birth of Impressionism: Masterpieces from the Musee d'Orsay as well on my second visit. I wish I gotten it before reading Roe's book, as it would have been an extremely useful addition to my enjoyment as my only frustration was not being able to see all the paintings that she mentions. However, as other reviewers have mentioned, it is not so much about the art, but about the personal and cultural milieu in which the paintings were created. I think she did a marvelous job. Much of the material appears to come from letters of Berthe Morisot. and I am now beginning to read Anne Higonnet's biography, Berthe Morisot.