As artists, we have all read or heard stories about American artists traveling abroad and returning filled with new ideas, having had great adventures and learning from the masters in the museums. As a curator, a gallerist, editor/writer and fine artist, I have seen and learned first-hand the value of travel abroad with peers and its positive influence on the work we are all creating today, as well as the new opportunities it can offer to us all.
Mary Cassat who was lucky enough to be an American woman who journeyed to Paris and studied the masters, learned from and painted alongside the Impressionists, then showed with them. From the intriguing stories of John Singer Sargent and his portraits of Parisian aristocrats, to the California Impressionist Guy Rose, who then went to Giverny, France and painted alongside Claude Monet, and brought back a fresh palette, and inspired light filled canvases for a movement that lasted over 30 years. Paris, with its plethora of art museums, ranging from the Louvre with the Mona Lisa and giant works by Peter Paul Rubens, to the D’Orsay that carries the largest collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionist works, to smaller museums like the Rodin where artists can visit the home of the artist and gain inspiration from his walls, his works, and his history, studying these great masters abroad has often influenced modern day painters.
Another aspect of European inspiration comes from the lively artist groups, for example in Tuscany and Paris, who came together as painters and writers and created movements and even bravery among themselves to stretch out of their comfort zones. These were the original “collaborations”, or “collabs”, hundreds of years before the Instagram collabs we know today. The Italian artists often known as “The Macchiaioli” were a group of Tuscan painters, around the 1800’s who focused on landscape paintings with color and light, (pre-Impressionists) and often painted en plein air. Their camaraderie and combined style helped them gain influence and acceptance. Did you know that later there was an Italian artist who showed with the French impressionists? Giuseppe De Nittis showed in the First Impressionist Exhibition in Paris in 1874. That is something new I learned while there exploring the museums during my travels.
I often think of the other famed groups in history, such as the “Lost Generation” Hemingway, Joyce, Pound, Fitzgerald, Eliot. This group included gatherings held in Paris bistros and bars some 100 years ago and had both writers and artists, such as Picasso and Man Ray. It even included their supporters Gertrude Stein and owner of the Shakespeare and Company American bookstore Sylvia Beach. They would engage in a day or evening of lively discussions and encourage or even critique one another. An honest artist critique can be so valuable for another artist. This group was a big influence on me as a writer and an artist myself, even though it was years before me.
Trips are filled with art history, alluring new subjects, and traveling with like-minded artists which can create a strong camaraderie that is of such value to an artist. Studying the master’s together, asking what colors they used, and sharing ideas while looking at larger than life group scenes by Peter Paul Rubens while discussing his compositions and group figure design, is often better than being in a stale classroom.
If you visit art supply stores on these trips you may often gather great information from paint companies that made the pigments for the masters found in the Museums and how new synthetic pigments later encouraged the Impressionist’s color. I have learned about genres of art as well, such as the post-Impressionist group called the Nabi’s. All of these reasons: studying the historical masters, finding new alluring subjects, the camaraderie of traveling and learning with your peers are priceless.
This blog has been written and shared with the artists and collectors at Oil Painters of America, simply reminding us that we are all already a similar group, that we are often influencing one another by seeing others works at our annual exhibitions, learning together at “Lunch and Learns”, and at OPA events.
Many of us have already joined one another on trips and have gained new friends as well as a world of visual and intellectual experience. It has been a vital part of my journey and inspiration as an artist, writer and curator. I would like to encourage you to stand in front of the amazing historical masterworks of art, to enjoy long discussions about art history, find new subjects, and paint on location in some of the most beautiful places in the world to influence and inspire the work you are creating today. The new subjects may help you gain a new gallery, or group show with friends. The instant camaraderie of attending a travel workshop is also so important, I feel, as well as painting in our studios we often need to hear and be with others. I hope this blog has encouraged you to study the masters, join a travel workshop, such as “Americans in Paris”, and band together with your fellow OPA members.
Merci!
Vanessa Françoise Rothe
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