California Impressionists
"After its introduction at the Paris Salons in the 1870s, French Impressionism found its foothold in 1886 when Claude Monet (1840–1926) established his home, studio, and garden in the rural French village of Giverny. By the 1890s Giverny had attracted an international art scene, with a significant number of Americans taking part; nearly three generations, or successive groups, of impressionist painters colonized the serene spot under Monet’s spell. Several second- and third-generation American Impressionists in
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California Impressionists
"After its introduction at the Paris Salons in the 1870s, French Impressionism found its foothold in 1886 when Claude Monet (1840–1926) established his home, studio, and garden in the rural French village of Giverny. By the 1890s Giverny had attracted an international art scene, with a significant number of Americans taking part; nearly three generations, or successive groups, of impressionist painters colonized the serene spot under Monet’s spell. Several second- and third-generation American Impressionists in Giverny, such as Richard E. Miller (1875–1943), Colin Campbell Cooper (1856–1937), and Guy Rose (1867–1925), went on to play significant roles in the development of the movement in California. Their brand of impressionism emphasized the decorative quality of the subject, with a nod to Japanese aesthetics. For some of these artists, such as Miller, the figure remained a constant focus. But for many others, the pleasant scenery and climate of the Land of Sunshine transfixed them. In Giverny, their subject matter was most often ladies at leisure; in California, the landscape became their muse. When Guy Rose returned to the Los Angeles area in late 1915, he entered a small but active community of artists, including William Wendt (1865–1946) and Hanson Puthuff (1875–1972). The region was on the verge of a flourishing impressionist scene, almost twenty years after the East Coast embraced the movement, which was further catalyzed by Rose and other artists emerging from Giverny at the outset of World War I. The region’s artists would then continue in a particularly Southern Californian Impressionist style that was far removed from the concurrent early-twentieth-century “modernist” movements, such as cubism and fauvism, then sweeping Paris and New York. Unlike the evolvement of French Impressionism, California Impressionism did not take on a style of dissolving forms and portrayals of city life and people; it instead held on to realistic representations and focused on the resplendent light and beauty of the land, loosely painted en plein air. Granville Redmond (1871–1935), William Wendt (1865–1946), and Edgar Payne (1883–1947) are a few of the best-known historic Southern California landscape painters. Each name conjures up a vivid aspect of California’s landscape: Redmond is known for majestic oak trees at sunset and fields of flowers; Wendt was inclined to paint green meadows and valleys, ringed by oaks and sycamores; Payne’s work encompasses the snowcapped peaks and icy-cold lakes of the Sierra Nevada. None of these artists was born in California, but all lived and died there. Redmond arrived as a toddler, in 1874, when his family moved from Philadelphia after a bout with scarlet fever left him deaf and mute. Wendt, born in Germany, emigrated to Chicago, where he studied briefly at the Art Institute before settling permanently in Los Angeles in 1906. Payne also came via the Midwest, arriving in Laguna Beach in 1918. Redmond, Wendt, and Payne each contributed to the distinct Southern Californian Impressionist style. Redmond popularized the state flower—poppies—in sweeping vistas executed in the pointillist manner of Camille Pissarro (1830–1903). Wendt painted on a grand scale—large canvases with broadly rendered depictions of majestic scenery. Payne’s more rugged and highly colored scenes took Wendt’s monumental landscapes to the next level."
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Artists Associated with California Impressionists — 70 artists:
