Impressionism and Post-Impressionism

On View: West Building, Main Floor

138 artworks on view.

Shown from the hips up, a pale-skinned woman holds an open, gold-colored fan in her lap in this vertical, loosely painted portrait. Brushstrokes are visible throughout, especially in the clothing and background, so some details are indistinct. The woman’s body is angled slightly to our left, and she looks off in that direction with her chin pulled in. Her dark eyes seem unfocused under faint brows. She has an oval face with a straight, flaring nose, and her full, pale pink lips are closed. Her brown hair is pulled back, and she wears a white scarf tied under her chin. Her high-necked dress is painted with strokes and dabs of celery green and butter yellow and is shaded with mauve pink. The cuffs are scarlet red where they fold back over her forearms. The woman sits on an upholstered sofa with a rounded back, painted in similar shades of pale green and yellow with touches of red. The back of the sofa and the woman’s head are reflected in a framed mirror just behind the couch. The area in the top right corner of the composition is especially loosely painted but strokes in white, red, green, and blue. The artist signed the painting near the woman’s shoulder to our left: “Mary Cassatt.”

Woman with a Fan

Mary Cassatt

c. 1878/1879

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1963.10.95

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M86

We look up at the exterior of a church that soars the height of this vertical painting. The church is painted with visible dabs and strokes of sky blue, cream white, golden tan, and a few touches of pale, shell pink to create a blurred look, as if seeing a reflection in the rippling surface of a puddle. The church façade is angled to our left, away from us. The main door and its surround takes up the center of the composition, where a rectangular door is set within nested, pointed arches that lead up to a narrow, tall, triangular gable. The point of that gable overlaps the round rose window, which is the same width as the portal surround below. Spires flank the central section and rise steeply off the top edge of the painting. The sky above is painted as a field of pale lapis blue. A few dabs of darker blue and green suggest people, tiny in scale, standing near the lower left corner. The artist signed and dated the lower right, “Claude Monet ‘94.”

Rouen Cathedral, West Façade, Sunlight

Claude Monet

1894

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1963.10.179

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M80

A small child stands facing us on a sun-dappled path that runs up the center of a garden dominated by towering yellow and burnt-orange sunflowers in this loosely painted, vertical scene. The light comes from our right so long, sea-green and plum-purple shadows cross the peach-colored path. The path is wide at the bottom center of the canvas and narrows as it reaches the steps of a house, beyond the garden. Close to us, four blue and white porcelain urns line the path, separating it from the grassy banks to either side. The urns are filled with tall stems with coral-pink and cardinal-red flowers. The child stands about halfway back along the path, where the garden transitions from grass to the banks of tall sunflowers. A few strokes in front of the child could be a small dog. Behind the child, a woman and another child stand on the steps. The woman wears a cornflower-blue and white dress, while both children have bare legs and wear white clothes and yellow hats. All three have indistinct facial features and peach-colored skin. The house spans with width of the composition. It has an amethyst-purple roofline with two chimneys, and the petal-pink walls have mango-yellow highlights. Windows are covered with blue latticework. Above the house, fluffy white clouds float against a vibrant blue sky. The artist signed and dated the painting at the lower right in dark blue, “Claude Monet 80.”

The Artist's Garden at Vétheuil

Claude Monet

1881

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1970.17.45

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M85

This painting shows a woman sitting upright in a yellow-and-tan reclining chair, her body turned to the right, her face turned toward us. Her skin is pale, with shades of pale yellow and light pink, and shadows in a pale green shade. She has deep-set brown eyes, arched eyebrows, and a small pink mouth set in a neutral expression. Her curling hair is light purple and put in an updo. She is wearing a white and lilac polka-dot blouse with puffy sleeves, complemented by a long skirt with stripes of black, gray, and green. In her lap, she holds a small black, tan, and light-green dog, cradling it gently with both hands. The background features a grassy area enclosed by a wooden fence painted with lines of green, teal, and dark red, with a large, slightly bent tree trunk visible to the left. The sky above has a cloudy appearance made by crisscrossing lines of white, purple, pink, and green. The brushstrokes in the painting are thick and visible, especially those in the background. In some places, like the fence, the tree trunk, and the back of the chair, the light brown surface under the paint is visible.

Lady with a Dog

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

1891

Oil on cardboard Accession ID 1972.9.22

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M80

Orchard in Bloom, Louveciennes

Camille Pissarro

1872

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1970.17.51

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M82

We look across a forested ravine painted in deep greens and blues at a terracotta-orange building at the top of a hill at the center of this nearly square, loosely painted landscape. Spring and moss-green trees grow along the ravine in front of us and up the left side of the canvas. Shadows within the densely forested area are painted with slate and royal blue with touches of plum and lavender purple, and the blue continues into the sky in the upper right quadrant of the composition. The sky is visible through the pointed, arched windows on the upper level of the building, giving the impression that it might be incomplete or in ruins. The building is made up of two stories over a protruding base, which could be a fortress-like structure below or a cliff face. Loose, thick brushstrokes are visible throughout.

Château Noir

Paul Cezanne

1900/1904

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1958.10.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M84

We look down onto a wide, bustling, tree-lined avenue filled with buildings, people, and horse-drawn carriages in this horizontal painting. Muted, warm browns, sage green, slate blue, and brick red dominate the urban scene, which is loosely painted with short and long dotted brushstrokes so some details are difficult to make out. The street extends diagonally up from our lower left with wide gray sidewalks on either side, which are lined by slender trees sparsely dotted with brown leaves. Dozens of pedestrians meander individually, in pairs, and in small groups on the sidewalks in coats and hats. Across from us, multi-storied buildings with store fronts at street level stretch across the width of the canvas. Rows of windows line the facades. Horse-drawn carriages move in both directions on the street and two omnibuses have pulled to the curb closest to us, where passengers have lined up. Two brick-red, hexagonally shaped kiosks stand opposite each other on either side of the street about halfway along the boulevard. Sunlight filters onto the scene, creating a dappled effect in some areas, especially over to our right. The artist signed and dated the painting in dark green in the lower right corner: “C.Pissarro.97.”

Boulevard des Italiens, Morning, Sunlight

Camille Pissarro

1897

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1963.10.198

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M89

A bank of flowering bushes, possibly roses, fills most of an enclosed garden in front of a white house in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is created using visible dabs and strokes of scarlet red, pale yellow, rust orange, and shell pink for the roses and kelly, teal, and forest green for the greenery. The cloud of flowers fills most of the left two-thirds of the composition, and dabs of shamrock and moss green and delphinium blue indicate grass and other plants around it. To our right of the roses, a couple walks near a fence in the distance. Painted with only a few strokes and touches of paint, one person wears a white dress and hat, and the other a dark gray suit and hat. A celery-green tree grows up the right edge of the canvas and curves toward the ivory-white, three-story house. The upper story is tucked under a pitched, ash-brown roof, and aquamarine-blue shutters flank the windows. More trees surround the house and line the fence. Brushstrokes in white and nickel gray suggest clouds against the ultramarine-blue sky. The artist signed and dated the painting in black near the lower left corner: “Claude Monet 73.”

The Artist's Garden in Argenteuil (A Corner of the Garden with Dahlias)

Claude Monet

1873

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1991.27.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M82

Verdant green fields roll in undulating waves back alongside a road in this horizontal landscape painting. The fields take up the left and center of the composition and are painted with thick, curling strokes of emerald, pea, and celery green, and corn yellow to suggest grasses and plants. The pale green road runs up along the right edge of the painting, and is layered with strokes and daubs in butter yellow, spring green, and faint blue. The fields and road meet the horizon line about halfway up the canvas, where an aquamarine-blue sky swirling with white and periwinkle-blue clouds fills the top half of the painting.

Green Wheat Fields, Auvers

Vincent van Gogh

1890

Oil on canvas Accession ID 2013.122.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M83

We look across a body of water at two houses, some smaller outbuildings, and a houseboat along the far bank in this abstracted, horizontal landscape painting. Painted with thin, loose strokes of moss and pine green, pale topaz and denim blue, and black, many of the details are indistinct. The cream-white houses have dark roofs and are nearly engulfed by tall, lush trees that reach nearly to the top of the canvas. Fog-gray clouds float against a watery blue sky above. The green of the trees is reflected in the water below, where some of the canvas remains unpainted, especially in the lower left corner. A crimson-red blotch appears over the houses.

At the Water's Edge

Paul Cezanne

c. 1890

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1972.9.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M84

A sun-dappled dirt road runs away from us, parallel to a shimmering body of water under a blue sky dotted with white clouds in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes, so some details are difficult to make out. The road moves back in space from the lower right corner of the canvas. It is lined with tall thin trees with narrow, dark green canopies to our right and with marshy grasses to our left. The road ends or curves in front of a row of terracotta-orange and gray buildings and smokestacks along the horizon, which comes about a third of the way up this composition. Two women and a child stand and sit in the shadows at the base of the trees to our right. Two sailboats drift on the glassy surface of the water. A row of celery-green trees on the horizon to our left and the sails of the boats reflect in the water. The artist signed the lower right corner, “Claude Monet.”

Argenteuil

Claude Monet

c. 1872

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1970.17.42

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M82

Shown from the waist up, pale-skinned young man wearing a bowler hat looks at us from the corners of his eyes in this vertical portrait painting. His body is angled to our right, and he cuts his dark eyes back to look at us, his lips pursed. He has a wide face, round cheeks, and a narrow chin. His white lapels are flipped up, and he wears a buttoned blue jacket. The black bowler hat seems a little too small for his head. The man and setting are painted with areas of mottled, streaked color. For instance, his peachy face is shaded with visible strokes of slate blue. His white collar is a blend of ice blue and frosty green, and his jacket is built up with daubs and strokes of marine blue, moss green, and gray. The white of the canvas underneath shows through in some areas, especially in the jacket. The wrist of one hand resting in the man’s lap is visible, and the back rail of the wooden chair in which he sits peeks out past the shoulder to our left. The wall behind him is painted loosely with the suggestion of a diamond pattern in laurel and olive green, parchment brown, rust orange, and muted blue. A rail or frame running close and parallel to the right edge of the canvas is patterned with elongated red teardrop shapes outlined by white, against a celestial-blue background.

The Artist's Son, Paul

Paul Cezanne

1886-1887

Oil on canvas Accession ID 1963.10.100

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M84