Impressionism

In 1874, fifty-five artists held the first independent group show of Impressionist art. The unfriendly reviewer Louis Leroy to a canvas by Claude Monet first applied the name impressionism in 1874; it has come to be used very freely. In easiest terms, French Impressionism was an especially undersized, avant-garde movement whose affiliates tested from 1870 to 1880 with painterly habits to attain light on canvas. Impressionism entails a certain technique, primarily the acquirement of light on canvas through the use of pure, lurid, bright colours, and such stylistic and compositional elements as a shallow, two-dimensional space, occupied by compressed forms, an uptilted picture plane resulting in a high horizon, off-centre focal points, preference for dynamic diagonals rather than static verticals and horizontals, and the juxtaposition of decorative patterns and textures.



Post Impressionism is a term used to describe those influenced by the Impressionism movement. There is no fixed style to Post Impressionism like there was with Impressionism, all of the artists of the Post Impressionist movement had different directions with their painting style, and they weren’t a coherent group like the Impressionists either. Their work does however have more of an emotionally charged style.



Post Impressionism was given its name in 1910 when an exhibition of the works by the likes of Cezanne, Gauguin, Van Gogh and Toulouse-Lautrec were shown in The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. British art critic gave the works the term of Post Impressionist. Post Impressionism did not begin in 1910 however, the term almost seems absurd as Post Impressionism began while the original Impressionists were still very much popular and in action. Post Impressionism began in France, much like Impressionism did and ended not long after Impressionism, Post Impressionism and its main artists with their distinct and very different styles mostly all led or inspired other...