An alternative title for this fascinating, disturbing book could be Paris in Tears. Pulitzer Prize winning Smee looks at the way art and politics are combined and how women were so restricted at the time, yet some fought back. It is in four parts, nineteen chapters, with a prologue and epilogue, a list of illustrations, a bibliography and a great index.
The meticulously researched and detailed book is about the 1870-71 Siege of Paris and how various artists survived (or didn’t), their struggle to make art pay, how their styles changed, the conservatism of the Paris Salon and Salon De Refuses and how the lives of major artists (Degas, Mont, Manet, Renoir etc) intersected with the politics of the time. Victor Hugo called it “The Terrible Year”. The horrors of the Siege and the civil wars are depicted. He also vividly brings to life the intimate relationship between Edouard Manet and Berthe Morisot. There is also mention of Rossini and Sisley.
Balletomanes will remember the Siege as it included the death of Giuseppina Bozzachi, the first Swanilda in Coppelia.
The events are followed through the eyes of the great figures of Impressionism. We learn how some artists stayed/returned to Paris while others (eg Claude Monet and Camille Pissaro) fled to the UK and elsewhere. Berthe Morisot, Edgar Degas and Eduard Manet were trapped in Paris during the siege and heavily involved in its shifting politics, while Frédéric Bazilleand, Pierre-August Renoir and assorted other artists joined regiments outside of the capital.
As in the current wars today there is much devastation, bureaucratic delays and bungling, and problems with avenues of communication.
What is engaging is Smee’s description of one part of the history of photography, with Nadar’s hot air balloons and special cameras.
Smee tells the story of those dramatic days through the eyes of great figures of Impressionism. Édouard Manet, Berthe Morisot, and Edgar Degas were trapped in Paris during the siege and deeply enmeshed in its politics. Others, including Pierre-August Renoir and Frédéric Bazille, joined regiments outside of the capital, while Claude Monet and Camille Pissarro fled the country just in time.
Major political events, the invasion and siege by the Prussian army and the downfall of Napoleon 111 greatly affected everyone.
Then there was the Paris Commune, composed of rebels who desired to deconstruct any administration organisation that repressed people. Yet they were ruthlessly suppressed in a horrific bloody thrashing, reducing Paris to burnt out rubble.
Smee brings to life the plots and counter-plots, how everyone was petrified and the military deadlocks. Recovering from the Siege left the nation and those who survived greatly perturbed, most people grieving, despairing, struggling to survive and extremely depressed.
The establishment of a unified German kingdom under the Kaiserwas also of great importance .
For artists, the future looked quite desolate. Some stopped working completely, others found their work slowing to a trickle.
The rise of Impressionism, Smee argues, was at least partly in response to all this and artist’s trying to capture the frailty of life and light. We follow how styles were influenced and changed, for example in the first Impressionist exhibition of 1874 and their search for depicting impermanence – the emphasis on the change of seasons, snatched street scenes and light and shadow.
What is engrossing is Smee’s focus and documentation of the love story between Berthe Morisot, the only woman to play a major role in the movement from the beginning and Eduard Manet, the ‘father of Impressionism’. Their intimate, convoluted, intricate relationship is examined and we learn a lot about Morisot, the woman at the centre of Impressionism.
Morisot had a lot to deal with as a woman – while trying to make a living through her art, she was patronised and sometimes degraded or ignored, particularly as a single woman. Both Berthe and her sister Edma were artists but Edma gave up her artwork when she married. Their brother Tiburce joined the army.
When posing for Manet she was expected to be chaperoned .Smee documents all this through various portraits (eg ,Olympia, Repose , Berthe Morisot with a bouquet of Violets) and also Berthe’s paintings (On the Balcony, The Sister, The Cradle). Mostly she concentrates on depicting the intimate interiors of a woman’s life but struggles about this. Berthe ends up marrying Eduard Manet’s brother Eugene!
Penetrating and arresting, Smee shows how the Paris Siege and the Paris Commune had an extensive affect on the history of art and how art can be inspired by disaster. For us artists and art lovers this book is highly recommended.
https://www.textpublishing.com.au/books/paris-in-ruins-love-war-and-the-birth-of-impressionism
