Harley J. Earl - A Biography

Harley J. Earl (1893-1969)

Ž   Harley Earl was the first artistic director of a large car company, working for General Motors (GM) from 1927-1959. This was due to the popularity of his first big design, the 1928 La Salle Phaeton.

Ž   Before Earl, car companies designed their cars with engineers, based on function and cost, and didn’t care much for styling. If a car company wanted to sell a luxury car, they would build a chassis, and send it to a custom body shop to make the coach on top.

Ž   Harley Earl’s father, J.W., owned such a custom shop, making unique, designer cars for movie stars in Hollywood. He taught his son, Harley, everything he knew. His job was basically, “to turn turkeys into eagles.”

Ž   Harley brought several innovations to car design:

1.     As the first head of the Art & Color Section, he designed all the coaches, so they could be completed in the factory, without sending chassis to custom shops.

2.     He opened an all-woman design team to create controversial new models and designs. When he retired, a lot of women designers lost their influence, and jobs.

3.     He used clay to build models for his designs.

4.     He designed the very first prototype car, the Buick Y-Job, for the sole purpose of watching and learning from viewers’ reactions.

Harley Earl driving the 1939 Buick Y Job

He would drive his prototypes to see how people reacted. “If you go by a school and the kids don't whistle… back to the drawing board.”

5.     He also developed the idea of dynamic obsolescence in car manufacture, by changing the style of a car model every year or two. This was the first time you could see if a car was new or old, and how old, just by the styling. The idea was, fashionable people would treat their cars like clothes, always wanting to show off the latest trend. It’s an idea that’s standard today.

6.     He also designed the first hardtop roof, wrap-around windshields, tail fins, and two-tone paint jobs.

7.     He also designed the first Chevy Corvette and the GM Firebird.

1953 Chevrolet Corvette

1953 GM Firebird 1

1959 GM Firebird 3

8.     Earl’s designs won popularity contests at every Detroit Auto Show for his entire career.

9.     When Earl left GM, it was the largest and most successful car maker in the world, earning 50% of the market, mostly due to his designs.

10.  Earl once said, "My primary purpose for twenty-eight years has been to lengthen and lower the American automobile, at times in reality and always at least in appearance."

11.  Earl died from a stroke at his home in Palm Beach Florida, age 75.

12.  In 1986, he was added into the Automotive Hall of Fame.

13.  His designs are still popular today. Many of his cars from the 1950’s sell for millions of dollars today at auction.

4.  Every year, NASCAR gives the Harley J. Earl Trophy to the winner of the season-opening Daytona 500 race. The trophy has his design for the first Firebird on top.

5.  According to the Detroit Free Press, he’s the third greatest artist who worked in Michigan, behind Aretha Franklin and Stevie Wonder.

Suprematism - Russia's Artistic Revolution

What was it about? What were the goals?

Not to be confused with Supremacism (meaning racism, basically), this was an art movement founded by Kasimir Malevich in 1913, focusing on simple geometric shapes, arranged in compositions of varying complexity and limited colours, emphasizing dynamic placement of shapes. The goal was to ignore the real world and everything in it, and break everything we see and know into simple, pure abstract shapes, and see what kind of feelings and qualities they emote. Malevich wrote,

“Under Suprematism I understand the primacy of pure feeling in creative art. To the Suprematist, the visual phenomena of the objective world are, in themselves, meaningless; the significant thing is feeling, as such, quite apart from the environment in which it is called forth.”

It was a kind of experimentation, and Malevich even went so far as to say there was a spiritual aspect to his work.

A bit of historical context:

Malevich began painting around 1900, experimenting in a number of different art styles: Symbolism, Post-Impressionism, Fauvism, Cubism, and then Futurism. In 1913, he began to form his new style while designing the sets and costumes for Kruchenykh’s Futurist opera, Victory Over the Sun. This led him to a series of works he displayed in 1915 at the Last Futurist Exhibition of Paintings ,10 in Petrograd. With a slightly distorted black square hanging in the corner of the room, like a Russian icon, he launched the movement.

The Sick Man, by Vasili Maximov, 1882 (not a Suprematist)

         This artwork shows a typical Russian iconic corner. People would pray to these for help.

Last Futurist Exhibition of Paintings ,10 in Petrograd, 1915.

Malevich wrote a great deal to explain his ideas. When he first exhibited his 1915 show, he wrote “From Cubism and Futurism to Suprematism.” It was a big success, and Malevich formed a group of like-minded artists. They started a journal, and Malevich then got a job teaching art in Moscow.

In 1928, Stalin decided he didn’t like abstract art. He confiscated Malevich’s paintings, and forbade him to continue his Suprematism. Part of this had to do with Malevich’s anti-political views, writing:

“Art no longer cares to serve the state and religion, it no longer wishes to illustrate the history of manners, it wants to have nothing further to do with the object, as such, and believes that it can exist, in and for itself, without ‘things’. . . ”

Malevich kept painting, trying to reinvent representational art in his portraits of everyday peasants and workers. However, he still wrote in protest, The Non-Objective World: The Manifesto of Suprematism, so that his works would be understood. In 1930 he visited Poland and Germany, where the Soviet Union suspected he was spreading his artistic ideas, so they put him in prison for two months.

Malevich continued to paint realistically for five more years until he died of cancer (he signed all his works with a small black square). At his funeral in 1935, his casket, tombstone, and the car that drove him there were all decorated with a black square.

How was it represented in the other arts – music, architecture, and literature?

Although less famous, Malevich began to draw 3D views of his compositions, taking them in a more architectural direction, and then began building plaster models of his works. Although they weren’t buildings, per se, they were suggestive of buildings, and were a huge inspiration for Zaha Hadid, who was one of the leading, international architects of our time.

Architecton, 1923-8, Malevich

Besides this, Lazar Khidekel managed to become a successful Suprematist architect in Russia, surviving Stalin, and building the Club for Red Sport Int. Stadium and a cafe for the Paris World Fair of 1937.

Was it great?

No. Not in comparison to the greatest artists of other movements. But, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t successful, attractive, or inspiring. It was all these things, at least to some extent. Suprematism is basically the culmination of one artist trying his hand at many different styles of art, and in the end deciding to start over from scratch – to reinvent art, one shape at a time. It’s easy to look at his simplest works, and think, “This emperor has no clothes.” But, you shouldn’t look at these as individual artworks. Back in 1915, they were all hung together in such a strange, haphazard way that they formed one large art installation. Think of them as a sequence, like an animation.

Ok, so maybe it’s still not that impressive, but the big simple squares shouldn’t be thought of as artworks so much as building blocks, almost like one-celled organisms, from which Malevich’s other artworks evolved. And in these works, he showed a good sense for design as he created compositions that were asymmetrical yet balanced, playful, and dynamic. Some are better than others – that’s how experiments work.

You might be surprised to learn that many artists do this same thing as an exercise to improve their compositions. Here’s an example of illustrator William O’Connor drawing thumbnail sketches in the style of Franz Kline (not a Suprematist), to find the best composition for his work:

Echoes, by William O'Connor

Were Malevich’s works really spiritual? Evocative? Are the feelings you get from his work any more “pure” than when you see a Rembrandt, Klimt, or Michelangelo? I would say no, that was just his arrogance getting the best of him. But, I still see value in his art. Malevich was on to something, and it’s a tragedy that Stalin prevented him from continuing his work, right when it was developing into something close to great. In the end, Malevich’s black square became impressive, not as art, but as a sign of protest against Stalin’s tyranny.

Wait a minute. Didn’t Kandinsky do all this before Malevich?

Nope. It’s true that Kandinsky was older, and went into pure abstraction around 1911, and both he and Malevich were showing abstract art in the Der Blaue Reiter group. But Kandinsky’s improvisations were more globular, brightly coloured, Fauvist, and messy. He didn’t mimic Malevich’s geometric work till the 1920’s. Both artists used abstraction to explore ideas of spirituality and inner feelings, so they had a lot in common, but both were distinct.

Wait another minute, did Malevich just do this because he couldn’t draw or paint realistically?

No, he was a decent painter both before and after Suprematism – not the best, but decent, for the times:

Self-Portrait, 1908-9

Self-Portrait, 1933

Some leading figures:

Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944)

Kasimir Malevich (1879-1935)

Aleksandra Ekster (1882-1949)

Lyubov Popova (1889-1924)

El Lissitzky (1890-1941)

Sergei Senkin (1894–1963)

Ilya Chashnik (1902-1929)

Lazar Khidekel (1904-1986)

A look at how Malevich's ideas evolved:

Black Square

Black Circle

Four Squares

Painterly Realism - Boy with a Knapsack

Black Rectangle, Blue Triangle

Rectangle and Circle

Eight Red Rectangles

Airplane Flying

Suprematist Composition

Supremus No. 50

Suprematist Composition

Suprematist Composition

Suprematist Composition

Supremus No. 58

Symbolism - Art's 2nd Romantic Movement

“. . . you want me to look for truth and lies at the end of a stick with weasel hair tied to it? … I have knives, big knives… I’ll give you a fifty-yard head start... and take my glasses off. Good luck...”

- Ilaekae, from conceptart.org

What was it about? What were the goals?

Symbolism is basically a confusing name for what should be called Late/Gothic Romantic art, made in the second half of the 19^th century (of course, calling it Gothic is confusing, because that usually refers to art made before the Renaissance from 1200-1400 AD). This was a small, short-lived movement having more to do with poetry than painting, and centering in France. And, since Symbolism had more to do with theory and less to do with style it’s hard to tell just by looking whether an artwork is Symbolist or not.

Symbolism was a rebellion against Realism. Whereas Realists only painted what they saw, portraying reality, however brutal or banal, Symbolists focused on spirituality and chose to portray the supernatural, exploring dreams, ideals, and their own imaginations. They wanted their work to express pure emotions as does music and poetry. Like Realists, Symbolists also claimed to paint what’s “true”, whatever that means, but stressed the importance of metaphor and, well symbolism. They felt the greatest truths couldn’t be painted directly or objectively, but subjectively––that any attempt by an artist to look at the world objectively was a form of denial and therefore dishonest. As the artist Cazalis wrote, he wanted, “to depict not the thing but the effect it produces.” You may wonder how this is possible without painting both, and how this differs from any previous artists and their work. So do I.

Even weirder, try this quote by the poet Gustave Khan, “The essential aim of our art is to objectify the subjective (the externalization of the Idea) instead of subjectifying the objective (nature seen through the eyes of a temperament).” Good luck trying to figure that out…

A bit of historical context:

Symbolism was one of the first art movements to have a manifesto, written in 1886 by Jean Moréas. It describes Symbolism primarily as a new literary movement, and makes the same arguments outlined above. Symbolism was promoted by the art critic (and occultist), Joséphin Péladan, who hosted several exhibitions in the 1890’s. While short-lived, Symbolist art is seen as a major influence in modern art, especially Expressionism and Surrealism.

The underlying philosophy of the period:

Symbolist writers were influenced by Arthur Schopenhauer, known as the philosopher of pessimism. He argued that art was, “a refuge from the world of strife of the will.” Schopenhauer argued that a person’s basic state is one of suffering, based on insatiable cravings and urges, primarily of “the will”––our urge to procreate and continue our existence, a base and meaningless urge simply to live. And, even when we get what we want, and our desire is satisfied, we immediately replace it with another, so that we can never be happy. Art helps us ignore these urges and problems for a time, while at the same time teaching us about the world in a way that science and logic can’t.

If that makes sense, this next bit won’t. Schopenhauer went further to say that a great artist must be such a genius that, while working, he completely forgets who he is, what his desires are, and thereby frees himself from the will. My first reaction to this: doesn’t the artist desire to complete a good painting? How is this different from any other desired project or undertaking? And after he or she finishes it, doesn’t he want to start another? Anyway, from this argument we get the stereotype of the Schopenhauerian artist – a misunderstood genius who neglects “the business of life” being obsessed with his art.

How was it represented in the other arts – music, architecture, and literature?

Symbolism was primarily a movement in French poetry, with the leaders being Baudelaire, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Paul Verlaine. The most famous novelist was Paul Adam. Playwrights included Maeterlinck and Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam. Symbolism played a big role in music too, as Schopenhauer considered it the highest art form. Symbolist writers loved the music of Wagner. In turn, these writers were a great influence for Claude Debussy, who used many of Verlaine’s and Maeterlinck’s writings in his works. They also influenced Scriabin and Schoenberg.

Was it great?

While there’s a lot of variety in style and quality, it’s fair to say some Symbolist art is really great. The greatest star is far-and-away Gustav Klimt. However complicated and confusing the philosophy may have been, it worked for Klimt. His artworks rank among some of the best of all time.

Some leading figures:

Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) poet

Théodore de Banville (1823-1891) poet

Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824-1898)

Gustave Moreau (1826-1898)

Arnold Böcklin (1827-1901)

Félicien Rops (1833-1898)

Odilon Redon (1840-1916)

Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898) poet

Paul Verlaine (1844-1896) poet

Jacek Malczewski (1854-1929)

Jean Moréas (1856-1910) poet

Jan Toorop (1858-1928)

Gustave Khan (1859-1936) poet

Gustav Klimt (1862-1918)

Gaston Bussière (1862-1929)

Edvard Munch (1863-1944)

Carlos Schwabe (1866-1926)

Alfred Jarry (1873-1907)

Some of the most famous artworks of the time:

'Jason and Medea', by Gustave Moreau, 1865

'Self-Portrait with Fiddling Death', by Arnold Böcklin, 1872

'Isle of the Dead', by Arnold Böcklin, 1880

'The Theatre of Shakespeare', by Gustave Klimt, 1886

'I Lock My Door Upon Myself', Fernand Khnopff, 1891

This painting’s title quotes a poem by Christina Rossetti (sister of the Pre-Raphaelite painter, Dante Rossetti), and her poem quotes a Bible passage (Romans 7:24) dealing with inner-conflict. This causes us to wonder what the painting has to do with internal conflict – is it in the woman’s calm expression? The wilting flowers in the foreground? The geometric shapes of the background? Is Khnopff suggesting that looking yourself in is a good thing? It’s hard to say. Much of this painting is deliberately mysterious. Is that a spear beside the woman? Who is she anyway? Where is she? Why is there a bust of the Greek god Hypnos? We don’t know, and yet, something about the mood of this painting is clear. The puzzle it presents mirrors the existential struggles we face daily – to find meaning in life and our actions.

'The Scream', by Edvard Munch, 1893

'The Vampire', by Edvard Munch, 1895

'Death and the Grave Digger', by Carlos Schwabe, 1895

'Schubert at the Piano', by Gustav Klimt, 1899

'Adele Bloch-Bauer I', by Gustav Klimt, 1907

'The Kiss', by Gustav Klimt, 1907-8

'Death and Life', by Gustav Klimt, 1915

Impressionism – Modernism Takes Hold

Some notes taken from Waldemar Januszczak’s documentary series The Impressionists: Painting & Revolution.

What was it about? What were the goals?

Impressionism was an art movement based on several ideas:

·         It was an act of artistic rebellion, in which artists who had been rejected by the Paris Salon formed their own club, and held their own independent art exhibitions––what art historian Waldemar Januszczak called “eight art shows that changed the world.”

·         Impressionist painting was cheerful and optimistic, celebrating the new modern world: the transformation of Paris, new technology such as railroads, and the rising, liberated middle class. It studied modernity in detail, inspired by realists like Courbet and Manet.

·         Stylistically, Impressionists cared very much for the nature of light and colour and how it was affected by time of day, weather, reflections, and atmospheric conditions. They believed in painting outdoors, ignoring little details and eschewing precise drawing. Instead, they cared about working quickly, capturing the essence of a subject, getting the colours and shapes right with big bold, expressive brushstrokes.

·         They painted on a white background––we take it for granted today, but before the Impressionists, artists preferred working on dark-ground under paintings.

·         They also avoided black paint, instead mixing complimentary colours for darks and greys.

·         Since they tried to finish most works in one sitting, there was no use of transparent glazing, so the works are all opaque.

·         Impressionism also worked with optical mixing, placing colours side-by-side without blending, an idea that would be explored further with Pointillism.

·         Impressionism began to end as the optimism of modern life gave way to anger over growing poverty, lack of worker’s rights, and class struggle. It gave way to the pessimism of expressionist art.

A bit of historical context, and what made it modern?

To understand how Impressionists were revolutionary, you have to understand the salon system and how it worked. A salon was a juried exhibition, and the jurors were the professors of the Academie des Beaux-Arts. They only accepted artwork that fit their taste and sensibilities. Likewise, they only admitted students they liked into the Academie, and only suggested their best students to paint commissions for the state, and then to join their ranks as new professors. Getting a place in the Academie assured one of success and fame, but meant you had to paint exactly what they wanted. It stifled freedom and creativity. As noted earlier, many artists and movements struggled to gain acceptance under this system. The Impressionists failed too, but then they decided to undermine the whole system by holding their own revolutionary shows, helped by the great art dealer Durand-Ruel.

Impressionism couldn’t have existed without new technology:

1.      Paint tubes, that allowed artists to leave the studio, painting outdoors.

2.      New synthetic colours in these tubes, such as: cobalt blue, ultramarine blue, cerulean blue, viridian, and cadmium yellow.

3.      Folding easels, that folded up into a light, convenient box, easy for travel.

4.      Brushes with tin ferrules, for flat brushes and clean, thin lines.

5.      Brushes made from coarse pig’s hair, for scratching around thick globs of paint.

6.      New pastels, made of pigment and chalk, allowed for drawing quickly in colour.

7.      Railways, to transport artists to many different towns and places.

8.      Photography, showed artists how people and animals look when moving, and influenced compositions. Before them, most artists chose a main subject as the focal point, and everything else was secondary. The Impressionists challenged this, at times placing several focal points, putting into question if a work was about the sitter or the background, creating an effect like a camera snapshot, as if you were really there. The Impressionists’ loose, painterly style was also a reaction to photography, which devalued the notion of precise, realistic rendering. Impressionists instead focused on the aspects of picture making that photography lacked – colour and subjectivity.

In addition to new technology, Impressionism was also influenced by the asymmetrical compositions and colours of Japanese printmaking which was very popular in the 19^th century.

The underlying philosophy of the period:

There are several core concepts to great Impressionist painting. They shared the Realist belief you should only paint what you see right in front of you. They felt, like the Barbizon School, you should go out and find your subjects around you. They also felt an artist is like a record keeper of history, and should record real life, whatever’s happening now, so that future generations may gain a greater understanding of the times. Since this was of fundamental importance, little details were insignificant clutter. Impressionists believed in creating beauty, but found it in the basic forms and colours of light.

How was it represented in other arts – music, architecture, and literature?

Impressionism was popular in a number of other arts. Impressionist cinema came into fashion from 1919-1929 with Abel Gance, Epstein, Dulac, Delluc, and others. In music, Debussy and Ravel are considered the greatest Impressionist composers. Their music favoured shorter works with bigger chords (5 and 6 part harmonies, not just 3), major 7^th chords, and whole tone scales.

In literature, Impressionism refers to works that describe, rather than interpret, the little things going around the characters and the thoughts in their heads, much like stream-of-consciousness. Writers include Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Virginia Woolf, D.H. Lawrence, and Joseph Conrad.

What made it great?

Any art teacher will agree that colour is the most evocative element in painting. It might not be the most important to the structure of a composition, but we have all kinds of mental associations with different colours, and we react automatically with joy to certain colour combinations. The Impressionists knew this and studied these effects in detail. As a result, they became some of the most popular artists who ever lived, their works being some of the most expensive, memorable, and well-loved in history. There’s a reason why so many pens, napkins, calendars, and coffee mugs use Impressionist art as decoration. Impressionists are favourites among crowds of people with no art training, from all over the globe. This also explains why it’s still in demand and there are so many Impressionist artists still working today.

Critics of Impressionism come in two forms. There were the 19^th century academics who complained of the lack of finish, precision, skill that made it inferior, to their eyes. Then, there are the Modernist critics of today who look back at this time and see quaint, traditional family scenes, and idealized cityscapes, creating false narratives of nostalgia and even promoting male oppression of women, etc. All of these critics attack Impressionism on an intellectual level; they tell you to ignore your lying eyes, and listen to their theories. Luckily, most people would rather look and enjoy the relaxing, beautiful pictures than listen to some half-baked theories about art.

What ruined it?

Some people will tell you that Impressionism ended as other experiments in art became fashionable – the constructivist approach of Cezanne, the vivid, expressive colours of Gauguin and Van Gogh, the wild lines of Toulouse Lautrec. It’s true that Impressionism fell out of fashion, and a wave of pessimism at modernity, as art historian Januszczak described it, may have turned audiences against it, for a time. But, impressionism keeps coming back, again and again. It’s the default way to paint and to teach painting all over the world. It’s considered the best practice for training as an artist.

What’s with the haystacks?

Monet is credited with painting haystacks as a popular subject for impressionist study. It was one of his favourite subjects at Giverny, and he would set up several easels in a row, painting the same haystacks over time as the light changed. The farmers, however didn’t like his work, and would actually remove the haystacks early just to spite him. Monet wasn’t the first to paint haystacks, either. Millet painted them fifteen years earlier, granted they were the backdrop for his gleaners and farmhands.

Some leading figures:

Camille Pisarro (1830-1903)

Edouard Manet (1832-1883)

Edgar Degas (1834-1917)

Alfred Sisley (1839-1899)

Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) (sculptor)

Oscar-Claude Monet (1840-1926)

Frederic Bazille (1841-1870)

Berthe Morisot (1841-1895)

Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919)

Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894)

Leading American Impressionists:

Winslow Homer (1836-1910)

Mary Cassatt (1844-1926)

William Merritt Chase (1849-1916)

John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)

Childe Hassam (1859-1935)

Frederic Remington (1861-1909)

Other Famous Impressionists:

Giovanni Boldini (Italian, 1842-1931)

Anders Zorn (Swedish, 1860-1920)

Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida (Spanish, 1863-1923)

Nicolai Fechin (Russian-American, 1881-1955)

Some of the most famous artworks of the time:

Realism – Modernism’s First Big Step

Notes taken from Beth Gersh-Nesic, Ben Politt, and Dr.’s Beth Harris and Steven Zucker of Khan Academy.

What was it about? What were the goals?

A simple way to think of the Realists is to see it as another step towards Modernism. Realists, mostly French painters who worked at the same time as Pre-Raphaelites, still used academic training, styles and techniques, while shifting interests away from the classics, and toward modern life and society. This was a time of rapid transformation as the industrial revolution changed technology, cities, and previous ways of life. Realist artists wanted to examine and critique these changes in their art. Gustave Courbet, the de-facto leader of this group, wanted to make “history paintings” about real life––what was happening now. He felt, if he couldn’t see it, he shouldn’t paint it.

A word about modernism:

“In the Stone Age, artists expressed themselves with crude pictures on the walls of their caves. Then there was a period of transition that lasted roughly 10,000 years. Then came Modern Art. Now we can express ourselves again. If you want to know the details, you can go to art school and spend thousands of dollars, but this is basically what they'll teach you. I've boiled it down.” – Brad Holland

A bit of historical context

So, what changed during the industrial revolution? Basically, everything. This was one of the first times in history when population and wealth grew consistently, year to year, at unprecedented levels. One of the earliest and largest businesses to industrialize was textile manufacturing. Gas was used for heating homes and for street lights, starting around 1812 in London, and lasting until around 1890 when electric lights began to replace them. Lights at night allowed factories to run longer and created a new nightlife in cities. Modern sanitation made cities cleaner. New railways, roads, and canals made travelling faster, safer, and cheaper. People began taking weekend trips out into the country, just for fun.

Paris, a centre of artistic development, had transformed as well, with ambitious new projects that tore down old buildings to create broad new boulevards. The city reinvented itself in a modern style with multi-class buildings, where the rich lived on the first floors, and the poor up at the top. This allowed for more social mixing and mobility.

The underlying philosophy of the period:

If you can’t see it, you shouldn’t paint it. Don’t dwell on the distant past because you weren’t there, so you can’t possibly know what really happened. Focus on the present and what’s happening now. You’re living in important, exciting times. You need to record it so others can understand what life was like when your present becomes the past––and painting is the best way to do it, because so many of the changes are visual. Also, don’t be fooled into only presenting “important people”. Every life matters equally, so everyone is important, not just the rich and famous. Use your art to draw attention to people who need it, not simply those who want it. Art critic Baudelaire also recommended that artists be a flâneur, or stroller, joining the city crowds, but quietly observing, so he could better understand and paint them.

How was it represented in the other arts – music, architecture, and literature?

Realism is a major movement in literature, philosophy, the theatre, and cinema. Realist writers include Balzac, Flaubert, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Henrik Ibsen, and Emile Zola. English writers include George Eliot, Henry Fielding, and American realists include Mark Twain, Jack London, Stephen Crane, and John Steinbeck.

What made it great?

Far and away, the clearest star of the Realists was Edouard Manet, for his ability to get into the heads of his subjects and present complex, conflicting emotions with longing and pain that you can only guess at, no matter how long you look. Manet painted people who speak to you with their eyes. His revolutionary subjects and style have led some critics to call him the first modern artist. Beyond this, many realist painters learned and imitated the Romantics in landscape, using the light of the sun to evoke feelings and add drama. Having said that, some of the work these artists produced is a bit mediocre, just like with any art movement.

Why was it so short-lived?

Much of what one might consider “realist” art of this movement is limited to 1845-1870. It’s a short amount of time. I would say the biggest factors in this were the small number of artists who fit the criteria, few students of note to continue the style and aesthetic onto a second generation, and a rising tide of new, fashionable styles that swept away interest for a time. Of course, there are many artists today who create highly realistic art that could be considered “realist” in treatment of subject. But, they don’t get much recognition, and it’s hard to draw a connection from the contemporary art world to a tradition that died over 100 years ago.

Was it really more realistic than other periods?

Yes and no, so it’s not the best name for the movement. The two main facets of realism were in the brushwork itself and the realist, objective construction of compositions, showing things as they would look in real life, with no attempt at idealization. If you look back you can find precursors to realism, for example many golden-age Dutch masters, as well as the anti-Rococo painter Chardin, who seems to have been a major influence on Millet and others. If you look back at the Pre-Raphaelites, their colours and subjects may have been otherworldly, but their attention to detail, perspective, and proportions were highly realistic. Waterhouse even subdued his colours to increase the realism of his works. What’s more, as many so-called “realists” got older, their works became less and less photorealistic as the influence and appreciation for impressionism grew. Many “realist” paintings feel unfinished and rough, and not what one might consider realistic.

Some leading figures:

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796-1875)

Honoré-Victorin Daumier (1808-1879)

Jean-François Millet (1814-1875) (Barbizon School)

Gustave Courbet (1819-1877)

Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) (poet & art critic)

Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899)

Édouard Manet (1832-1883)
Jules Bastien-Lepage (1848-1884)
Ivana Kobilca (Slovenian, 1861-1926)

Philip Alexius de Laszlo (Hungarian, 1869-1937)

American Realists (Ashcan School):

Robert Henri (1865-1929)

George Benjamin Luks (1866-1933)

William Glackens (1870-1938)

John Sloan (1871-1951)

Everitt Shin (1876-1953)

George Bellows (1882-1925)

Edward Hopper (1882-1967)

Peredvizhniki (Russian Realists):

Ivan Shishkin (1832-1898)

Vasily Perov (1833-1882)

Ilja Repin (1844-1930)

Vladimir Makovsky (1846-1920)

Some of the most famous artworks of the time:

The Stone Breakers, by Gustave Courbet, 1848

In this painting, two men break rocks to clear a path for a road. Nothing here is idealized. One worker looks too old for the job, while the other is only a boy. Their clothing is torn and ragged. The low-angle perspective shows only the men working in the foreground, with just a touch of sky and landscape high off to the right, making the men feel isolated and trapped. Their poses suggest exhaustion and pain. There’s nothing heroic about them. The brushwork is rough and uneven, like the stones themselves. Where most painters would focus on the faces and hands of the figures, Courbet treats them the same as everything else. They lack the monumentality of Ford Maddox Brown’s Work, but feel more “real”.

A Burial at Ornans, by Gustave Courbet, 1849-50

This painting shows a funeral of an ordinary man in Ornans––Courbet’s great uncle, although he didn’t add the name in the title. Courbet painted it large-scale and listed it as a history painting––something unheard of at the time. Most people would have considered it a genre painting since it depicted everyday life, but Courbet wanted to present this as an important part in history.

Other than the immense size, three other facts stand out that add to its realism. First of all, the man in front in the middle is a common grave digger, and Courbet paints him with a level of importance and dignity, signifying the importance of labourers. Second, there’s no real focal point in this work. Your eyes wander along like you would in real life. You see a variety of faces and expressions, some mourning, but some simply distracted or pensive––people who might not have known the deceased, or cared. There’s even a dog that seems to have wandered its way into the foreground, oblivious to what’s going on, and symbolizing nothing. Three groups of figures are treated equally here, the clergy on the left, the town officials and leaders in the middle, and a group of women on the right. There’s little interaction among them. Each figure seems alone in his or her thoughts.

Finally, there are no angels above or mystical lights from heaven. There’s nothing to suggest heaven actually exists. Courbet painted only what he saw, nothing more.

Ploughing in the Nivernais, by Rosa Bonhuer, 1849

This work may seem a bit boring until you learn some of the history surrounding it. In 1848, France went through yet another revolution, with yet another king being deposed in favour of yet another Napoleon. Politically, France was not doing well, but this painting seeks to show a different story. This simple picture of a farmer ploughing a field with his cows shows the strength of the French spirit along with its rich, fertile land. It calls for courage and calm in hard times.

The Gleaners, by Jean-François Millet, 1857

This painting depicts three poor beggar women who are gleaning, or picking through the field, looking for bits of corn to take home and cook for their families. They carry what little they can find in their skirts, which are tied up to serve as sacks for the grain. In the distant background, one can see the main crop, with large piles of grain and many workers engaged in similar activity, gathering it. But they have plenty of food while these three women have little. While the scene is harsh, Millet’s treatment is kind and gentle. He paints the women with soft round shapes, muted colours, all in similar pose to unify them. They are treated here with respect and solemnity, as Millet addresses this issue of poverty. At the same time, he hides their faces, emphasizing their anonymity – ignored by everyone in society.

L’Angelus, by Jean-François Millet, 1857-59

This work shows a farming couple stop their work as they hear the church bell ringing in the distance, so they stop to say a prayer, the Angelus, in honour of the annunciation of Mary. The work is sentimental, showing an example of moral life. The couple works hard every day, even to sundown, but they stop to pray. They know their place in the universe, and so on. The couple looks iconic and monumental. They’re back-lit so you can’t really see their faces, making them represent every man and woman who lives this simple, honest farming life.

Music in the Tuileries Gardens, by Edouard Manet, 1862

This painting shows a concert in a garden near the Louvre, which was held twice weekly, and attracted the rich and wealthy of Napoleon III’s Second Empire. Manet included several famous people here, the artists Bazille and Fantin-Latour, the writer Champfleury, and the composer Offenbach. Manet also included himself as a flâneur, standing on the far left, in the grey slacks. We, the viewers, are where the musicians should be, which is why so many of the sitters are gazing at us.

The work was mocked when shown, partly for Manet’s loose brushwork, that looked unfinished. Manet deliberately left some places unfinished to represent the way our eyes focus on one thing and disregard others. But, mostly people were shocked at the idea of such a large, monumental painting devoted to such an unimportant scene of modern life. This work was shown the same year Whistler exhibited the portrait of his mother, so the idea of devoting large works to ordinary people and things was still new. And, while the Pre-Raphaelites and Romantics had painted ordinary scenes before, it was rarely at this size, and they were always filled with symbolism. But, there’s no symbolism present here. It’s just a concert in the woods, nothing more.

The Railway, Gare Saint-Lazare, by Edouard Manet, 1872-3

This simple, straightforward painting is actually quite mysterious. We see a young woman sitting by an iron railing, a young girl standing next to her, her back turned to us as she watches a train go by. All we see is its steam. We have no idea who the two people are, but the woman has paused in her reading, and looks up at us, with a mix of curiosity and possible annoyance. Critics have debated what the point was to this picture, which shows Manet’s own studio off in the background to the left. Are the two figures trapped in a modern cage, or are they happily enjoying the new modern life? What do you think?

A Bar at the Folies-Bergère, by Edouard Manet, 1882

This painting shows a barmaid at her counter, in a large, boisterous theatre. There are acrobats above in the background, and couples flirting everywhere. You see them reflected in a large mirror placed behind her. The mirror is tilted so that you can see her back reflected to the right, and you even see your own reflection, as a young Parisian man, speaking to her. Like with The Railway, this work presents a mystery as we don’t know what the young woman is thinking. Her eyes look sad and thoughtful. She looks hesitant, knowing that her job will attract many men looking to flirt with her. While the counter top pushes her farther from us, we see in the reflection that we’re actually quite near her. This painting illustrates the kind of tension that people felt when in these situations – does the man just want a drink or something more? Will he make promises and is he telling the truth? She looks like she’s been hurt before and nervous about starting again.