Bathers at Asnières (1884)
National Gallery, London
Workers resting by the Seine; rejected by the Salon, shown at the first Salon des Indépendants
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Art
Georges Seurat
1859–1891 · French
Neo-Impressionism (Pointillism)
Founder of Neo-Impressionism, who replaced Impressionist spontaneity with a scientific method of placing small dots of pure colour side by side to mix in the viewer's eye. He died at just 31, leaving a handful of monumental, carefully planned canvases.
How to spot them
- ▸Surfaces built entirely of tiny dots of pure colour (pointillism / divisionism)
- ▸Still, stiff, geometric figures in profile, like a frieze
- ▸Parisians relaxing by the Seine, and circus, music-hall and nightlife scenes
Key works
A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (1884–1886)
Art Institute of Chicago
Parisians at leisure on a Seine island, including a woman with a monkey on a lead
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Models (Les Poseuses) (1886–1888)
Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia
Three models posing in his studio, with part of La Grande Jatte behind them
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Parade de cirque (1887–1888)
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Night-time circus sideshow, his first nocturnal scene
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Le Chahut (1889–1890)
Kröller-Müller Museum, Otterlo
High-kicking cancan dancers built from rising diagonal lines
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
The Circus (1890–1891)
Musée d'Orsay, Paris
His last painting, left unfinished at his death
Image: Georges Seurat · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Quick-fire facts
- •Called his technique 'chromoluminarism'; critics named the style Neo-Impressionism
- •Drew on colour theories of the chemist Michel-Eugène Chevreul
- •La Grande Jatte was shown at the eighth and final Impressionist exhibition in 1886
- •Paul Signac was his closest ally and chief promoter of Neo-Impressionism
- •Died suddenly in Paris on 29 March 1891, aged 31
- •Stephen Sondheim's musical Sunday in the Park with George is inspired by La Grande Jatte
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Sources
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Georges Seurat
- The National Gallery, London — Bathers at Asnières