Colour and light – The Legacy of Impressionism

The birth of Impressionism can be traced back to the 1870s. Changes in French art education, developments in science and research in colour perception all contributed to the emergence of the new style. Artists were fascinated by this new way of looking at the world, which was characterised by direct contact with nature and natural events. Artists now began to paint outdoors, which was made easier by the invention of new types of paint tubes and painting accessories. Landscapes became a popular subject among artists and art collectors alike in the 19th century.

The secondary movement known as Neo-Impressionism emerged in the mid-1880s, when painters developed new colour theories and began to use them as a foundation for their work. Because their process was systematic and often slow, the Neo-Impressionists abandoned outdoor painting and moved back to the studio.

One prominent feature of paintings of outdoor views is the artist’s desire to portray a feeling or sensation arising in nature. Starting from the 1870s, artists adopted a paler and brighter palette. Pictures of gardens and nature studies allowed them to investigate the lighting effects of different times of day and seasons on the appearance of the environment.

The home with its garden was one of the favourite subjects of painter Pekka Halonen, who lived in an artist community at Tuusulanjärvi lake near Helsinki. He painted details of nature in all seasons. Halonen had studied under the French artist Paul Gauguin and was well aware of new trends in art. For him, the new approach to art meant an abundance of colour and brushwork. The broad range of Colourism is also evident in his paintings of winter scenes, in which the cold light creates strong contrast on the snow.

Impressionism introduced new perspectives and compositions that were bold and experimental for their time. In Monet’s Floating Ice on the Seine, the horizon line sits almost perfectly in the middle of the canvas. This creates a kind of mirror effect, turning the upper and lower halves into a reflection. Although the overall impression is peaceful, the work includes a great deal of contrast created by complementary colours, such as blue-orange and violet-yellow.

Ellen Thesleff painted many works in Italy. The paintings were different: they had glowing colours and a distinct character created by bold brushwork and composition. Thesleff’s new works generated a lot of discussion and criticism in their day. Her new and quite different works, with their glowing colours and distinct character created by bold brushwork and composition, generated a lot of discussion and criticism in their day.

Tyko Sallinen’s The Washerwomen also caused a stir. The way the characters are depicted was considered crude. The picture is painted on a grounding layer that shines through the colours, making them strong and bright. The person on the left is the artist’s wife, Helmi.

At the turn of the 1900s, artists acquired an interest in vitalism, outdoor life and healthy lifestyles. Vitalism can be interpreted as a reaction against the hard values resulting from urbanisation and industrialisation. Vitalists advocated spending time in nature as well as sunbathing and nudity. Direct contact with nature was also thought to boost creativity.

The island of Suursaari was the centre of Colourist painting for many Finnish artists, among them Magnus Enckell and Verner Thomé. In the late 1800s, it was a popular seaside destination for tourism and relaxation. Another key theme of Vitalist art was childhood and adolescence. These seaside scenes are both imbued with sunshine, warmth, light, colour, movement and a sense of stillness.

The small dabs of different-coloured paint interact with each other, creating new shades. Some Neo-Impressionists actually adhered to a principle known as optical blending, producing the perception of green colour with closely painted yellow and blue dots. Colourist theories were based on the observation of how light breaks down into different colours: a prism, for example, separates the sun’s white light into a spectrum – a rainbow – of colours.

This exhibition showcases early Impressionist works in parallel with later Neo-Impressionist art. It is often impossible to draw a clear distinction between the styles, because many of the new forms of expression coexisted with older ones.

A major change occurred in Finnish painting around 1910. Magnus Enckell’s work is typical of the colouristically exuberant style of his day, when artists liked to depict the intense atmosphere of the city, the new urban lifestyle. For the first time, cities and urban environments were seen in a positive light. This colourful, intensely expressive style also set the stage for the new art movements and schools of thought that succeeded Impressionism in the 20th century: Expressionism, Cubism and Futurism.