“Inspiring Impressionism,” a new exhibition at the Denver Art Museum examining ties between the impressionists and old masters, contains major examples by some of the best-known artists of all time.
Among the key figures represented are Mary Cassatt, Paul Cezanne, Jean-Simeon Chardin, Edgar Degas, El Greco, Claude Monet, Berthe Morisot, Camille Pissarro, Peter Paul Rubens and Jean-Antoine Watteau.
Here is a look at some of the show’s highlights:
RIGHT: Pierre-Auguste Renoir, “Confidences” (1875), oil on canvas, 32 by 23 3/4 inches. This sun-dappled canvas of a couple sitting under a tree and reading a newspaper together offers a quintessential example of the impressionist style. It depicts the modern bourgeoisie at leisure, using small swipes of color to convey the work’s stunning dance of light.
Rubens, “Susannah and the Elders” (1607), oil on canvas, 37 by 26 inches. Opportunities in Denver to see works by this towering master are exceedingly rare. This small yet superlative painting from the Galleria Borghese in Rome shows his ability to render lifelike nudes and create narrative drama.
Cezanne, “Still Life With Apples and Oranges” (circa 1895-1900), oil on canvas, 28 3/4 by 36 1/2 inches. This exhibition includes several first-rate examples by this pivotal artist, including this selection from the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. It has to be counted among the artist’s finest still lifes, with its skewed perspectives and complex compositional structure.
Diego Velázquez and workshop, “Infanta Margarita Teresa” (circa 1664), oil on canvas, 47 1/3 by 37 1/4 inches. The lively brushwork and other aspects of Velázquez’s works influenced several of the impressionists, including Cassatt, Morisot and especially Édouard Manet. This example from the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna is a dazzling example of the Spanish painter’s portraiture.
Manet, “Portrait of Berthe Morisot Reclining” (1873), oil on canvas, 10 1/4 by 13 1/3 inches. Evidence strongly suggests that Manet and Morisot were lovers, and he painted many portraits of her. If this is not the largest or most famous of those images, it is nonetheless an alluring, sensual depiction that strongly suggests the feelings he had for her.
Jean-Honore Fragonard, “A Young Girl Reading” (circa 1776), oil on canvas, 32 by 25 1/2 inches. Until the 1860s, Fragonard languished in obscurity, because his “lively sketches,” as one critic called his paintings, were seen as slapdash. But the impressionists admired his animated, spontaneous style, richly evidenced in this prototypical work from the National Gallery of Art.
Alfred Sisley, “The Pike” (1888), oil canvas, 16 1/2 by 31 1/2 inches. Though hardly critical to this exhibition, this easily overlooked work offers an unusual example of the artist working outside the landscape genre. It is an elegant composition, with a richly impastoed surface and shimmering colors.
