James McNeill Whistler ~ July 11 1834 - July 17 1903

As music is the poetry of sound, so is painting the poetry of sight. And the subject matter has nothing to do with harmony of sound or of colour. - James McNeill Whistler

The White Girl, 1861-62, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC

Van Gogh - The Roulin Family

Vincent van Gogh, La Bercuese, 1889
(Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Sunflowers, 1888
(National Gallery, London)

Vase with Twelve Sunflowers,  1888
(Neue Pinakhotek, Munich)

Van Gogh was living in Arles, when he painted a series of portraits of his friend postmaster Joseph Roulin and his family.  Monsieur and Madame Roulin took care of van Gogh at a time when he was lonely, both of his parents having past away and his brother living in Paris, they had become his close friends as well as a surrogate family.

Claude Monet - Grainstack Series

Claude Monet, Haystacks at Chailliy at Sunrise, 1865
(San Diego Museum of Art)

Monet revisited the subject of his earlier painting, Haystacks at Chailliy from 1865 when he began working on his Grainstack series.

Claude Monet, Grainstack, Sun in the Midst, 1891
(Minneapolis Institute of Arts)

He was living back at Giverny in 1890 and was going out everyday to paint in the fields that surrounded his house.  This was a very familiar landscape, right outside his door.  The Grainstacks were 20 x 18' high man-made structures that were used to store wheat. It sometimes took a whole year to break them down, which was a great convenience for Monet.  He painted 25 canvases of the same motif with very little variations - some are one and some are two grainstacks - except for the light, weather and atmospheric effects.  He would set up a couple of easels next to one another and work on several canvases at the same time.

Claude Monet, Grainstack Snow Effect, 1891
(Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)

Claude Monet, Grainstacks at Sunset, Snow Effect, 1890
(Art Institute of Chicago)

Claude Monet, Grainstacks in the Sunlight Midday

Claude Monet, Two Grainstacks at The End of The Day, Autumn
(Art Institute of Chicago)

Grainstacks were monumental subjects on the landscape symbolizing fertility and prosperity; they were directly associated with the French countryside.  Monet was rendering the light and air surrounding the object, its distinctive light and atmosphere, this, he referred to as 'enveloppe.'  The subject became secondary to the colors and effects.  He was trying to capture air and light with paint.  It is relatively easy to decipher what he is trying to accomplish in the Grainstacks at Sunset, Snow Effect - the same blue used in the surroundings is picked up in the Grainstack, breaking down the barrier between the figure and ground. Monet captured the haziness that surrounded the figure. In these paintings, Monet's love of the French countryside, deep admiration for nature and his distinctive individualism all come through in eloquent simplicity. 1


1  Paul Tucker, Monet and the Challenges to Impressionism in the 1880s

Hokusai, 36 Views of Mount Fuji, 1826-1833                              

ukiyo-e Japanese Woodcut Prints Monet was aware of these prints and he owned a couple of them.  He was probably influenced by the idea of taking one subject and going over and over it with variations.  

                                         

Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt- Two Artist's Gender Related Differing Views

                

Edgar Degas, Ballerina and Lady with a Fan, 1855                                        Mary Cassatt, At the Opera, 1879

           (Philadelphia Museum of Art)                                                                                  (Boston Museum of Fine Arts)

Although there are only two women painters amongst the famous Impressionists, their different approaches in accordance with the feminine points of view, to the same subjects as their male counterparts is refreshing.  Mary Cassatt was an American artist from a wealthy family, working in Paris.  She became friends with and was invited to exhibit with the Impressionists  by Degas.  He was even reported to have said " No woman, has the right to draw like that."  Being a woman artist from upper class society had one major drawback and that was the spaces of modernity she couldn't depict because she didn't have access to them.  The theater and the opera were two places of entertainment that could accommodate both proper ladies as well as men.  

These two paintings by Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt both are a discourse about looking, spectatorship and dominance.  The main difference between the two is who is doing the looking and does the one being looked at have any power over the situation.  In Degas' Ballerina and Lady with a Fan, although a woman is sitting in the front of the balcony watching the ballerina perform for her, she is also dominated by the male viewer who would be sitting right behind, looking over her shoulder.  

At this time, ballet was an interlude in an opera.  The sitting arrangements at the boxes over the stage with the privileged view were always occupied by women in the front row and men in the back for protection.  In Degas' painting, we the viewers are in the position of the male spectator, which was also the artist's view.  By the use of a compressed space, Degas has created a sense of dominance; the lady dominates over the ballerina who is working, dancing for her while the male viewer is watching the ballerina and his surroundings dominating over the whole scene.  In Mary Cassatt's At the Opera, however, the viewer is beside instead of above and behind the lady and there is a sense of space around the female spectator.  

According the Griselda Pollock social spaces were policed by men watching women, positioning the spectator outside the painting.  In Cassatt's painting we can see the actual man who is doing the policing in the balcony to the woman's right.  Contrary to Degas' female spectator who is holding her opera glasses in her hand, we see a lady more actively engaged with looking in Mary Cassatt's painting because she is holding her binoculars to her eyes and even leaning forward to get a better look.  She does not acknowledge the gaze aimed in her direction, which confirms his right to look and appraise.1

The very proper lady in Cassatt's At the Opera, in a black dress that covers her completely from neck to toe is dressed for a matinée.  She is also wearing a hat and gloves, the only bit of skin visible is her face and neck.      Since the Degas takes place in the evening the lady's dress with the open shoulders would be considered normal- her arms and shoulders would be the only places she would expose.  On the other hand, the ballet dancers, exposing their arms and legs, would be objectified and considered sexual commodities. This was also reinforced because of their origins from the lower classes while the ladies are from the upper classes.

The main differences come into being, I think in how the different genders choose to approach the process of looking and spectatorship.  The female artist, although acknowledges her subject is being regarded by a male gaze, she depicts her as having some power of ignoring it by watching the performance herself.   Meanwhile, in the male artist's painting  the ballerina is on stage displayed for the male gaze, and the lady with the fan, although herself is a spectator, is positioned in a space that puts her under the dominant gaze of the male sitting behind her, giving neither subject any control over her faith what so ever.