BuzzFlash Reviews

BUZZFLASH REVIEWS

This lovely coffee table book from an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art a few years back.

Another BuzzFlash special value price, including shipping and handling.

"Plenty of art books cover Impressionist works; The Impressionists at Argenteuil tells the story of how one village became the birthplace of the movement. Monet first settled in Argenteuil in 1871, looking for new material there; others followed and the movement was created. Full-page color reproductions of Impressionist works are accompanied by surveys of over fifty paintings."


From the publisher:

A small, unspoiled town on the outskirts of Paris, Argenteuil became a hub of artistic activity during one of the most exciting periods in art history—the decade of the 1870s, when true impressionism was born. Drawn to Argenteuil in search of new inspiration, Claude Monet settled there in 1871. The beauty of the town and its proximity to Paris, along with the amiable presence of Monet himself, soon attracted other artists who found there the inspiration to create some of the most lyrical, dazzling, and progressive paintings of the day. This richly illustrated book explores the responses to Argenteuil of six influential painters in more than fifty of their works.

With scenic vistas still unmarred by urban industrialization, Argenteuil in the 1870s was ideally suited to the experiments in plein-air effects that became the hallmark of classic impressionist works. Paul Hayes Tucker describes the lively artistic exchange that developed among Monet, Eugène Boudin, Gustave Caillebotte, Édouard Manet, Auguste Renoir, and Alfred Sisley as they worked, often side by side, in and around the town. At Argenteuil, Tucker shows, the artists’ fascination with atmospheric effects, depictions of modern life, and dialogue with one another coalesced to produce a unique and revolutionary body of work.

National Gallery of Art:

Argenteuil retained much of its rustic charm and during the 1850s became a popular destination for day-trippers from Paris, drawn there by the pleasant riverside promenades and boating activities. This spectacular stretch of the Seine, where the river reached its widest and deepest points, hosted a great variety of events, from sailing and steamboat races to water jousts and recreational boating. Argenteuil was therefore a town with many facets, a place that combined leisure and labor, fields and factories, rural beauty and urban life. These contrasts epitomized the modernity and change that the impressionists sought to embody in their novel landscape paintings.


BUZZFLASH REVIEWS