Nature as Muse: Inventing Impressionist Landscape Hardcover - 2014

From the publisher

In mid-1800s France, artists left their studios to paint outdoors. Landscape, previously suitable only as backdrops for depictions of historical, religious, and literary events, became a worthy subject itself. In a matter of decades the Impressionist landscape was invented. Featuring rarely seen paintings from the collection of Frederic C. Hamilton of Denver, supplemented by works from the Denver Art Museum, this book presents a broad-ranging history of Impressionist landscape--from the pioneering artists who painted in the forest of Fontainebleau and such paragons and teachers as Courbet, Corot, Daubigny, Boudin, and Manet through the central figures of Impressionism--Pissarro, Monet, Renoir, Sisley, and Morisot--and ultimately to Caillebotte, Czanne, and van Gogh, whose works marked the start of a new era. A final chapter on the American painters Chase, Twachtman, and Hassam gives an idea of Impressionism's inroads into the United States. Gorgeously illustrated with many close-up views and double-page details of the thirty-five featured artworks and a generous selection of reference illustrations, this book takes a fresh look at the development of one of the most beloved painting styles of all time.