The Kunstmuseum Basel present the outstanding work of the impressionist Camille Pissarro and his friends until the 23.01.2022
From an underrated to an outstanding artist
The early years in St. Thomas
Camille Pissarro (or Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro) was born on the Island of St. Thomas (located in the Caribbean Sea) on the 10th of July 1830. While he grew up between the Jewish community and the European continent, his father send him to a boarding school in France at the age of 12.
Therefore, he witness the energy of Europe and the important studies he will do at the Savary Academy in Passy (near Paris). While he grow up, he became interested about art and old masters from the 16th and 17th century.
Nonetheless, Monsieur Savary (the director of the Savary Academy) gave him a lot of lessons about drawings and paintings and suggested him, he should returned to St. Thomas to create from "nature".
The years passed at St. Thomas, Camille Pissarro was 21 years old, but he will witness his most important event in his life, the meeting with the Danish artist Fritz Melbye. While the two artists evolved in their practice, Melbye inspired Pissarro to become a full time artist. To do so, he will teach him how to paint and to draw while being his friends on this lonely island.
In 1855, the two of them moved to Paris where they begin their journey as the assistant of Anton Melbye, the brother of Fritz Melbye.
Moving to the continent
While Pissarro discover the new and transforming life of Paris, he studied and discovers new and avant-guarde artists due to his job as an assistant of Anton Melbye.
He studied the pictures of Courbet, Millet and Corot while learning and perfecting his art at the École des beaux-arts and at the Academie Suisse. While he discovered them, he also became friend with Corot due to his teaching method and his classes with art student.
The exhibition : friends and connections
While the exhibition is curated by Josef Helfenstein (director of the Kunstmuseum Basel since 2016) and the Co-Curator Christophe Duvivier (specialist of the work of Camille Pissarro and director of the Musée Pissarro and Tavet-Delacour).
Therefore, the exhibition reflect the choices of the two curators : 8 rooms, 7 relations, 1 audio experience and many more...
Room 1 : Composition, influence and connection
When you enter the first room dedicated to the start of his career, you will encounter a double sided portrait of Camille Pissarro.
As you look around this portrait, you can see is works paired with his influences : Charles-François Daubigny and Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot (Picture 3). This two artists and friends of the impressionist master influence him during his early years as a Parisian.
While they escape Paris to go to Barbizon, they form a group of artists, friends and avant-garde artisst of the time : the Barbican School. Therefore, they changed their subject to nature and landscape.
Room 2 : On the edge
As Pissarro move back and fourth between Barbizon and Paris, he took classes at the Académie Suisse in Paris. This Académie was a king of open studio where you will need to paid to get a course. At that time, many "outsiders" took this road and enrolled into a class, such as Claude Monet, Paul Cézanne and many others.
In this room, you're starting to see the evolution between the Barbican School and his meeting with the Parisian School of Art. Therefore, when Camille Pissarro showcase his works with the Barbizon School, the Parisian don't agree with their technique and style, nonetheless they had an idea of their own.
At the same moment, they defined themselves as the "Impressionist", due to their painting style referring to the wild, the landscape and the effects of light. The term "Impressionist" grow bigger after many exhibitions and Pissarro exhibited in a lot of them, but he rarely sold a picture...
Room 3 : The intense and pure relationship between Pissarro and Cézanne
Camille Pissarro met Paul Cézanne for the first time at the Académie Suisse in the 1860s.
Nonetheless, the two artists come from bourgeois families but they are the "outsiders". They don't want to do something normal and expected by their parents, they want to changed their love for paintings into an inner revolution.
Both of them fought about the rules and the conventions of the Salon and how restrictive they are for the artists and their evolutions. Therefore, the two men work on and off together for 10-15 years along with their families.
But in 1872, Pissarro move to Pontoise and Cézanne to Auvers-sur-Oise, their we're so close together that they worked, hours and days on paintings together. The "peak" of this collaboration arrived in 1873 due to new inspirations and motifs in their town and the friendly discussion they had together. This adventure end when Cézanne move to Provence in 1885...
Room 4 : The intriguing relation between Gauguin, Degas and Cassatt
Paul Gauguin and Camille Pissarro is a strange but familiar connection. While Paul Gauguin was an art collector and a banker, Pissarro helped him to become an artist and showcase is work in the Fourth Impressionist Exhibition in 1879.
During the year, Gauguin visit the atelier and house of Pissarro in Pontoise to paint, together, for the first time. But, as they grow and learn together, the two of us diverged. Gauguin move from Paris to Tahiti to discover and experiment a new career and art making.
Due to the departure of Paul Gauguin, Pissarro try new techniques such as printmaking with his friends : Mary Cassatt and Edgar Degas. While Degas invited new friends to join the impressionist group in the last 1870s, he was already an important pastelist.
The three artists work together to shared their techniques, tips and creations with a great influence on impressionist picture. Therefore, they create and incredible ensemble of works on papers for the journal "Le Jour et la Nuit" (although it was never printed).
Room 5 : Neo-Impressionism, Pissarro new influence and avant-guarde
In the early 1880s, Pissarro was lost in his art due to his routine and the lack of buyers for his paintings or drawings.
Room 6 : Drawings, the unknown side of the Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist
Since the start of this practice, drawing on paper was a classical thing to do as an artist. To relax their hands before a painting session, to sketch on their way home or to prepare a bigger or more important piece of art.
As the Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist became more and more important, it was clear for them to transform this perception of drawing. Not just as a sketch, but as a their own work of art. Therefore, many artists of the group started they journey into sketching : Georges Seurat, Camille Pissarro, Paul Cézanne, etc.
Room 7 : Éragny: freedom, joy and power
Another milestone in Camille Pissarro's life, his move with his family to Éragny (near Normandy). While the move was complicated due to the importance distance separating his friends, Paris and the impressionist group, he will be the best time to relax and found a permanent home for his family.
The story of the house is even more complex, they first rented it before purchasing it with the help of Madame Pissarro and Claude Monet. Therefore, Pissarro had enough space for him and his children's to paint, draw and make print.
Nonetheless, many children's of the Pissarro became artists : Lucien (1863–1944), Georges (1871–1961), Félix (1874–1897) and Ludovic Rodolphe (“Ludovic-Rodo”, 1878–1952). From artist to craftsmen and tapestries (mostly with Jeanne : 1881 - 1948) to the creation of their own artistic language and technique.
Room 8 : An "hommage" to himself...
The last room of the exhibition is dedicated to Pissarro himself and the later years of his career. During those years, he was greatly influence by the use of series from Claude Monet works and practices. And more precisely to the 1884 exhibition of The Cathedral at the Paul Durand-Ruel Gallery.
From the views of Paris to the seascape of Le Havre, he would regularly travel to different cities to paint inside his hotel room (due to an eye disses). Therefore, the windows of the place will give him the perfect condition to paint, from composition to the different day and weather of the year.
And many more... PISSARRO I SOUNDS
Informations about the exhibition
Place: Kunstmuseum Basel | Neubau
Date: 4.9.2021 – 23.1.2022
Curators: Christophe Duvivier and Josef Helfenstein
Ticket: Available on the website of the Kunstmuseum Basel OR at the front desk of the museum
Informations about the Kunstmuseum Basel
Kunstmuseum Basel
St. Alban-Graben 8
CH-4010 Basel
Phone: +41 61 206 62 62
Fax: +41 61 206 62 52
Mail: info@kunstmuseumbasel.ch