It is interesting how new genres in art are often dismissed by the same societies inspiring the evolution. Nations and cultures change, artists respond with new ways of seeing, and publics and critics are usually uncomfortable with the art reflecting the changes. This was the case with the rise of Impressions, occurring with the rise of industrialization. That process literally reshaped the Western world, virtually demanding new artistic perspectives. As the following reflects, my own view is that Impressionism was virtually a necessary lens through which artists could begin to translate the social and industrial recreating of life as traditionally known.
In considering what may have been the most important influence generating Impressionism, I believe it was a literal impact. Social changes notwithstanding, industry radically altered all that was seen in what had been pastoral settings or quaint cities. For long centuries, art had focused on developing classical technique to better capture attractive realities. Suddenly, the English field was bisected by railroad tracks. Dramatically, factories were spewing fumes in urban landscapes previously constructed of churches, shops, and rows of homes. It then seems likely that artists like Monet, Degas, Manet, and others felt a need to reinterpret reality. Artists typically pursue truth and, when the truth long known is transformed, a new way of seeing is required. In this case, the literal impression gave way to the subjective or interpretative. This is not to say that these artists rejected reality or sought to beautify it. Rather, they were exploring how sensory perception itself could reshape reality, and uncover truth not evident in the harsher landscapes.
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"Industrialization and Modernism".
I also believe that initial criticism of Impressionism had little to do with the nature of the genre itself. More exactly, it is ordinary that societies react negatively to anything unexpected in the arts. This occurs in music and theater as well. What happens is that people are not able to define the new perspectives. The work does not resemble what has been accept as art, so a hostile response is triggered as a defense. For example, Monet’s Impression Sunrise, today considered an Impressionist masterpiece, triggered a critical response which would be attached to most of the leading artists pursuing the genre. A noted art critic compared it to unfinished wallpaper, and this in itself reflects a complete unwillingness to consider that the art was only moving in another direction.
Then, Impressionism was presenting ideas about society as well, in simultaneously “blurring” focus and directing it on subjects not suitable for classic art. Degas’ In a Café, for example, makes no real statement about the woman and the man drinking. At the same time, there is something disturbing in them as outcasts, or of the lowest classes. As with all Impressionism, then, this was art defiantly rejecting traditional exaltations of the beautiful. It was art challenging the viewer to consider unattractive possibilities and/or suggesting that the most ordinary landscapes had layers of meaning not seen through an academy-style, classical approach. In retrospect, then, it seems inevitable that critics and societies would initially retreat from Impressionism, if only because it expanded possibilities of art, asking more of the viewer.
That the great Impressionist masters are revered today is both ironic and inevitable. So many paintings we now consider masterpieces were rejected as amateurish and “not art” in their time. Arguably, this is the fate of all art that seeks to innovate, simply because the public has no frame of reference with which to react to the new. In my opinion, however, and beyond any other accomplishment, the Impressionists did what real artists must do: they witnessed a changing world and created a new way of seeing it.
