It was April 15, 1874, in the former workshops of the photographer Nadar, boulevard des Capucines in Paris. Berthe Morisot, Edouard Degas, Claude Monet and Auguste Renoir came together as a cooperative limited company to open the first Impressionist exhibition, a movement that would forever change the course of art history.
In 2024, the 150th anniversary of this first exhibition will be celebrated far beyond Paris. The Musée d'Orsay, which houses the world’s largest collection of works of this movement, will indeed lend 178 of its paintings covering a wide temporal spectrum for several months, even going to draw from the pre and post periodsimpressionists with paintings by Daubigny or Manet and up to Bonnard. These works will leave the platforms of the old station to travel in 34 museums throughout France. Among them, that of the Beaux-Arts Jules Chéret in Nice, continuation and end of our series.
Nice, city of artistic proliferation of the XIX and XXe centuries
From the 1820s, the Côte d'Azur became a popular place for wealthy people who came to spend the winter in the sun and built luxurious houses on the hills of Nice. « These residences, they will have to decorate them and surround themselves for this artists present on site or that they will bring from other countries ", says Johanne Lindskog, director of the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nice. The city thus becomes a place of artistic abundance that will mix artists of all origins, and this until the middle of the XXe Among them were great names such as Matisse, Chagall and Picasso, and Berthe Morisot, who stayed twice on the Riviera in 1881 and 1886.
It is on these two impressionist stopovers that returns the Jules Chéret Museum of Fine Arts in Nice until September 29 with a two-stage exhibition. First, since April 5, the hanging of the painting of Houses for sale in Bordighera offered by Monet to Berthe Morisot, at the heart of a presentation entitled «Monet-Morisot: le spectacle de la Riviera». « This painting had a place of honor in his mansion in Paris, both in his living room-workshop and in direct line from his room. We already see through this work the strong links between Monet and Morisot, but also between the impact that the Riviera had and in particular Nice sur Morisot and his imagination, since it brought back into the interior design of its home the characteristic elements of Nice and this atmosphere of the Riviera "says Johanne Lindskog. The scenography will also reproduce this interior and show how the painting was presented at home.
Works by twenty contemporary women artists by Berthe Morisot
Then, from June 7, other paintings lent by Orsay will be visible in the Musée Niçois and retrace the two stays of Morisot. The first, which will last longer than expected because of his daughter’s illness, will be devoted to subjects close to the sea such as representations of the Promenade des Anglais or the port of Nice. It was during her second stay that she turned to the city and the hills with paintings for example on citrus picking. “ She pursues reasons that concern her as in The Child with the Mandolin. Tiny details allow us to know that this painting was painted in Nice but its purpose is not to represent the Riviera ” says Johanne Lindskog. During his stays, the artist will rent with his family the Villa Ratti, which still exists today and has been restored in recent years to show it to the public.
In total, about sixty works by the painter will be presented, reflecting the painter’s attachment to the Riviera. “ It is a real tour de force because the works of Berthe Morisot made in Nice are not extremely numerous and are scattered throughout the world ", rejoices Johanne Lindskog. This set will be completed by paintings by Edgar and Julie Manet - husband and daughter of the artist - and by loans of paintings by Renoir, who also settled in the region at the beginning of the XXe The two artists were very close, Renoir taking care of Berthe Morisot’s daughter after her death. “ Julie Manet was very close to Renoir and will spend time at the Collettes estate in Cagnes-sur-Mer. The descendants of Berthe Morisot will remain attached to the Côte d'Azur and spend there regularly, or even settle permanently in different cities of the Côte d'Azur ” notes Johanne Lindskog.
This exhibition is finally an opportunity to highlight a part of artistic history totally unknown by presenting twenty contemporary women artists of Berthe Morisot who had a link with the Riviera or Impressionism. « This allows us to take stock of female creation at that time, and we realized that hundreds of artists produced, exhibited and sold works in Nice. Morisot is finally a gateway for us, to reveal a whole part of the history of Nice art that is again largely national and international ” says Lindskog.
The museum will plunge back into the XIXe century with routes documented by archives taking the exact places where Berthe Morisot laid her easel, including the pointed, fishermen boats on which she settled to paint the port. A way to involve audiences far from the museum and to look at the city in a different light.
150 years of Impressionism also in Orsay
The Musée d'Orsay invites you to plunge back into his masterpieces with « Paris, 1874. Inventing Impressionism ” until July 14. This exhibition will include nearly 130 works, including «unmissable» works by Monet, Renoir, Morisot, Sisley or Pissarro. This exhibition will then be presented at the National Gallery of Art in Washington starting September 8. In parallel, the museum will offer a real immersion in the opening evening of the 1874 exhibition with « An Evening with the Impressionists "a virtual reality experience that allows, for 45 minutes, to go back in time thanks to a re-enactment of the evening of April 15. A cycle of conferences accompanies to approach Impressionism from a new angle and an international symposium, organized on May 16 and 17 with the Fondation de l'université Paris Nanterre, will explore the current forms of the artistic movement.
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