This past September, just before it left town, I was able to see a really great exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art – “Discovering the Impressionists…Paul Durand-Ruel and the New Painting”. Well, I finally am getting a chance to write about it!

What a lucky opportunity! Apparently this was a “once in a lifetime special exhibit of Impressionist art associated with Durand-Ruel who as an art dealer in Paris that both championed and supported the new painting genre. Organized in part by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, this was the show’s only US stop. The exhibit presented over 90 paintings including well-known favorites — but more importantly, many that had not been seen in the US for decades, or ever before! Included in the exhibit were works by Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, Sisley, Degas, Manet, Cassatt and others.

To say it was an eye opener would be an understatement, and it certainly put an exclamation point on the notion that those who wish to improve their photography can learn a thing or two (or three or four, or many more!!) from studying the great painters.

Here are a few observations:

1. Most of the paintings were horizontals, but there were some notable vertical presentations.
2. All were rectangular in shape.
3. There was a great feeling of light, whether the subject was landscape or portrait. They were luminous!
4. Many of the scenes were of everyday life – people and their surroundings that included buildings, bridges and landscape.
5. One series of 15 paintings by Monet focused on a grouping of Poplar trees seen in different seasons of the year, different light, and in different weather conditions.
6. When looking at the paintings it seemed the perspective is what I would describe as close to “normal”, meaning not to wide or not to compressed.

I thought about these points for a while and it all brought me back to the wonderful Strand exhibit I had seen in ten months earlier – also at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Strand was very careful in thinking about his composition and so were the Impressionist masters. Strand focused on scenes of everyday life – people and their surroundings, just like the Impressionists. No exaggerated perspective in Strand’s work and the same was true of the Impressionist paintings I saw. This was particularly evident when looking at Renior’s tightly focused “Dancers” series. Well guess what, it turns out that Strand used only one lens for his 8×10 and 5×7 (modified to 5×6) cameras – a 12 inch Goerz Dagor. That is normal lens (e.g., analogous to a 50mm in 35mm format) for 8×10 and a mild telephoto for his 5×6. If I were looking at the paintings as photographs I would have guessed the same thing! There was a purity of vision and focus in both the paintings and the photographs.

All of the above is not meant to say that Strand was bald copier of the Impressionists. What I am trying to say is that I saw a lot in the Impressionist exhibit that could be and should be applied to photography, and upon reflection was applied by one of the greatest photographers of Twentieth Century.