Formal Ananlysis: Impressionist Painting

The piece I have chosen for this formal analysis is titled On the Bank of the Seine, Bennecourt by French painter and father of Impressionist painting, Claude Monet. The overall feeling I get from this painting is a peaceful calm. The colors are very cool and subtle. Monet uses colors that you would see in nature if you were actually sitting next to the lady at the shore of the water. The way he employs the darker shades on the side of the water closest to the viewer and the lighter ones on the opposite side really gives the sense of light and where the sun is at. The slight change between the dark and light also clues the viewer into the sun being low, just rising in the morning. The early morning feeling created by the effects of the color choices also gives a sense of freshness as though the entire painting is waking up. A large part of impressionism was an extreme Realism where the artist attempts to capture a split second in time and Monet does a good job of capturing the appearance and the feelings of waking up to a new morning.

Impressionism is most famously known for its loose brush strokes and the very painterly appearance to the final painting. This all relates to the capture of that quick moment in time and painters painting as quickly as they can. On the Bank is a good example of impressionist style qualities. The way this painting changes depending on the distance the viewer sees it is incredible. From far away the eye blends the colors and smooths the stroke so the details really come out. Closer viewing does not make these details disappear but reveals how they were created. The brush strokes that make up the grass and trees next to the woman on the bank, when looked at close, look so inexact and like nothing more than paint on canvas. When viewed as a whole painting however, you see that those brown streaks of paint create highlights on the tree trunk and make the whole piece more lifelike and harmonious. If we were to see this painting on display, they way that the paint is left and built up in spots would leave a distinctive physical texture that the viewer could pick up on visually, adding to the illusion of naturalism. There are two areas where the strokes look like nothing more than paint regardless of the view and they are the light green patch directly behind the woman, and in the mountains behind the houses on the right. These areas do not detract from the overall piece however, and are probably the result of the fast pace that the painting was made.The woman's gaze is directed toward the water and really draws the viewer's eye there as well. It looks as though Monet intentionally smoothed up his brushstrokes and the blend of colors in the water. The water is not choppy and rough, it feels so peaceful and serene and because he chose to have the water be in the middle of his format, those calm feelings bleed into the whole painting. 

The level of depth that Monet is able to achieve in this painting is impressive as well. There are very defined foreground, middle and background areas. Because painting outdoors was important to impressionist painters, being able to capture the depth and distance of what they were viewing really helps make the piece successful. He accomplishes this depth in a couple of different ways and by combining them all. The most effective one is the way he scales the figures and structures in the background compared to the woman in the very front. The size of the figures across the lake really help the viewer to understand how far it is to the other side of this lake and how big the buildings in the town are. Another way he helps add depth is through his use of detail. Though impressionist paintings are not particularly known for their high attention to detail, Monet gives enough to the clothing of the woman and structure of the boat in the foreground that the viewer can pick up on the dulling of detail in things like the figures and buildings in the distance. There re no recognizable clothing details on the people across the water and things like shingles do not appear on the roofs of the buildings. This is the way that details would fade and blur in the distance in real life, or as Monet was seeing it.