Paris in Ruins : Love, War and the Birth of Impressionism - Sebastian Smee

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Paris in Ruins

Love, War and the Birth of Impressionism

By: Sebastian Smee

eBook | 10 September 2024

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Impressionism remains wildly popular. Crowds flock to exhibitions by its greatest artists: Edouard Manet, Berthe Morisot, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro. But as Sebastian Smee shows in Paris in Ruins, a book of great narrative sweep and vivid detail, Impressionism was a complex reaction to an age of violence and war.

From the summer of 1870 to the spring of 1871, the 'Terrible Year', Paris and its people were cut off, starved and forced to surrender by Germans—before rebel republicans established a breakaway government or Commune. After the burning of central Paris, the republicans were crushed by the French army.

Smee tells this story through the eyes of these key artists, with a special focus on the intimate, enigmatic relationship between Manet—the father of Impressionism—and Morisot, the group's only female member in its early years. An indelible portrait of the city, Paris in Ruins captures the chaos of that year, and reveals how it had an incalculable effect on the development of modern art.

Born in 1972 in Adelaide, Sebastian Smee is now a Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic at the Washington Post. He has written widely about art, and is the author of The Art of Rivalry: Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art. He lives in Boston.

'Astonishing. Heartstopping. A true story confined by two brutal years, and the walls of a great city under siege, which exults in love, courage, beauty, mischief and the mystery of human intimacy.' Annabel Crabb

'4 stars. Readable and impeccably researched...For any lover of art history, it's a compelling read...[An] outstanding achievement.' ArtsHub

'Smee brings a fresh perspective by linking [the Siege of Paris and the Paris Commune] to the artistic development of Impressionism in general and of Manet and Morisot in particular...With exquisite sensitivity, he reads the similarities in [Manet and Morisot's] work from this period...' Caroline Weber, Washington Post

'As for the larger story of the Impressionists, Smee suggests that their refusal to depict war may have constituted "a collective act of psychological repression" or "an assertion of pacific value as an antidote to violence and trauma"—or both...Better than reality, he argues, than the one that they and their compatriots had just endured.' Julia M. Klein, Boston Globe

'An arresting tale...Smee brings to his task a wonderful eye and an engaging style that results in many insightful readings of the art he uses to illustrate the main points of his narrative.' Inside Story

'A book written in buoyant and accessible fashion...Paints subtle and intriguing portraits of Manet and Morisot...[Delineates events with] admirable clarity.' Telegraph

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