Berthe Morisot, Woman Impressionist

Berthe Morisot (1841–1895), one of the major impressionists, worked alongside Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. 

This exhibition of more than 60 paintings traces the exceptional path of a woman who defied the social norms of her time to join the Parisian avant-garde. 

Through her portrayal of the human figure, Morisot explored impressionist themes of modernity: the intimacy of contemporary bourgeois living and family life, the taste for resorts and gardens, the importance of fashion, and women’s domestic work. Deliberately sketch-like and unfinished in appearance, her works are not an unmediated reflection of her daily environment: they address the temporality of representation itself in a careful capture of the world that attempts to “fix something of the passing moment.”

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website

Image 1: Berthe Morisot, Self-Portrait, 1885. Oil on canvas. Musée Marmottan-Claude Monet, Denis and Annie Rouart Foundation. Photo courtesy Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris, France / Bridgeman Images.

Image 2: Berthe Morisot. In England (Eugène Manet on the Isle of Wight), 1875. Oil on canvas. Musée Marmottan-Claude Monet, Denis and Annie Rouart Foundation. Photo by Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY.

Whether or not you go, the exhibition catalog, Berthe Morisot, Woman Impressionist, examines Morisot’s remarkable body of work, painterly innovations, and leading role within the Impressionist canon. Today e Morisotis considered a major Impressionist artist, a recent development despite the respect received in her lifetime from peers. As the only female member of the Impressionist group at its founding in late 1873, Morisot played a major and multifaceted part in the movement, and her works were prized by pioneering dealers and collectors. Lush illustrations from throughout Morisot’s career depict her daring experimentations and her embrace of modern subjects in the city and at the seaside: fashionable young women, and intimate, domestic interiors. Texts examine her in the context of her contemporaries, the critical reception of her work, the subjects and settings she chose, and the state of Morisot scholarship, with never-before-published letters, interdisciplinary scholarship, and a specific focus on Morisot’s pioneering developments as a painter first, woman second.

Select Berthe Morisot, Woman Impressionist to learn more, or to place this book in your Amazon shopping cart. Your Amazon purchase through this link supports ArtGeek with a small commission.