THE CIRCUS
The painting I have chosen is The Circus by the famous painter Georges
Pierre Seurat. It was painted in 1891, but Seurat died before it was finished.
This is the last painting made by Seurat. It is painted on oil on canvas. He
made the painting with pointillist technique. Its dimensions are 180cm x 148cm. Paul Signac
(another famous neo-impressionist painter) bought the painting and then he sold
it to John Quinn. The painting was shown in the 7th “Salon des
Artistes Independants”. Now the painting is in the Orsay
Museum in Paris (France
This painting represents a pleasant scene in
the circus. In the foreground you can see the people who are performing the
show. There are a clown, a dancer and a juggler doing pirouettes. They are performing
together in the stage. The clown is waving a yellow a ribbon that reaches
almost the exit gate of the circus. There are also a horse and a person who is guiding
its performance. Behind them, in the background, you can see the grandstands
where there is a happy public watching the show. In the right upper part of the
background you can see some people playing different instruments like the
violin to make the show more pleasant.
The painter wanted to represent his subjective
view of the circus. He made the painting with pointillist technique. This
technique consists of making the painting with dots of pure colours. He used
primary colours with their complementary colours. He reduced his palette to
four colours in which warm colours predominate, especially yellow. The use of
curved lines is also striking. All this has a meaning: he wanted to represent
the joy of the show. The use of warm colours gives life to the painting, making
it more striking at first sight. In this way it is closer to the circus theme.
The dancer, the acrobat, the position of the
horse… give movement to the painting in the foreground in contrast with the
rigid figures of the grandstands in the background.
Seurat did several sketches of the painting. He
used the pure colours and he made the painting with dots of colour, because he
wanted that the small touches mixed in the eyes of the viewer.
Source: http://www.apolorama.com/2012/10/el-placer-y-el-orden-orsay-munal/09-521316/#prettyPhoto[slides]/0
Another characteristic of the painting is that
he represented the feelings the show awakened in the audience. Among the audience
you can observe that some of them are laughing, others are looking with
curiosity. The representation of these gestures makes the scene more real.
Georges Pierre Seurat is considered to be the leader
of neo-impressionism because he was the first painter to break up with the
ideas of impressionism. He was the first to show the artistic movement in his
works. His ideas were based on impressionism but the colours and the lines had
more importance. There are some neo-impressionist features like the use of pure
colours or the pointillist technique (paintings are made with dots).
Seurat was influenced by Delacroix and Ingres.
He was interested in the novels of Goncourt brothers about the French social
life. The specific inspiration of the painting was the Goncourt’s tale Frères
Zemgano (Zemgano Brothers).
The Circus belonged to a series of three
paintings. The paintings are Circus
Sideshow, Can-Can and The Circus.
Circus Sideshow
Can-Can
There were other painters who represented
circus scenes such as Renoir (Clown in
the Circus), Degas (Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando)
and Toulouse-Lautrec (Au Cirque Fernando
l’Ecuyère).
Clown in the Circus
Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando
Source: http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/arts/artwork/paintings-by-hilaire-germain-edgar-degas7.htm
Au Cirque Fernando l'Ecuyère
Seurat’s ideas were followed by Paul Signac and
later by Camille Pisarro. His ideas lead to the birth of Cubism and Abstract
Art.
This is Portrait of Félix Féneon by Paul Signac.
Some curious information is that after Seurat’s
death the painting was considered to be a plagiarism of a poster the painter
Jules Chéret made in 1880 for the Spectacle-Promenade de l’Horloge in the
Champs-Elysèes. Meyer Schapiro proved that Seurat drew inspiration from an
anonymous poster for the Nouveau Cirque.
In my opinion this painting is
beautiful because it is a painting with a lot of warm colours and it shows the
feelings of the audience who is watching the show. I like this painting because
it reminds me of childhood.
SOURCES:
1 comment:
Hello Carmen,
I've just corrected some small mistakes directly. You final mark is 9.5. See you!
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