How to Art: Paint Your Own Path No Matter what People Say
Going your own way. Veering off the path well-trod. Being a solo traveler without a permanent home. Whatever you want to call it – I saw my people on the walls of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Mom was a teacher……every activity informed our education. I was an outdoor kid. Saturdays in a museum seemed long and boring full of old school still life and portraits of dead people dressed oddly. Then I found the impressionists, Renoir, Lautrec and the “Moderns” Van Gogh, Seurat and others. I loved their brighter colors, bold and delicate clearly seen brush strokes.
As an adult, I read about the challenges Van Gogh, Seurat, Signac, Bernard and Angrand had as painters in 1880’s France. For many years, they were rejected by their families, the Paris elite and firmly juried art shows.
While in Chicago, I visited the Art Institute of Chicago and saw the “Van Gogh and the Avant-Garde*: The Modern Landscape” exhibit. *emphasis mine
Honestly, I almost cried. These were the paintings and coffee table books of my youth. The painters saw their world differently. It wasn’t for a lack of education; it was their way. Seurat created pointillism when he painted the “A Sunday on La Grande Jatte” which took many years to complete.
These young artists were preceded by the impressionists, Renoir, Lautrec and others who worked in Paris. Van Gogh and others walked to the outskirts of and farther from Paris. They documented life on the Seine away from Paris, industry, people and farms along the way.
In reflection, I see them as the painting social influencers of their time. Leading a revolution in the art world only appreciated after they died too soon. For me the exhibit was breathtaking. To see the paint strokes up close. The bold colors and distinct way each of them expressed their talent on canvas. Viewing them in one exhibit often painting similar scenes with their own point of view and palette.
Art is subjective. Beauty in the eye of the beholder. I am glad these then considered avant-garde painters have become part of today’s artistic lexicon. Their legacy preserved; painting methods accepted and taught. It made all my iPhone photos feel dull and flat.
I walked through the exhibit twice and may go back again. You can see it in Chicago until September 4, 2023. Then the exhibit moves to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam October 13, 2023 through January 14 2024, where it will be presented as Van Gogh along the Seine.
The curation is brilliant including a timeline of their lives, work and deaths. They are no longer considered avant-garde but live forever as piece of art history. A lesson in acceptance and forging your own path - no matter what.
