''A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte'' (french: Un dimanche après-midi à l'Île de la Grande Jatte) was painted from 1884 to 1886 and is
Georges Seurat
Georges Pierre Seurat ( , , ; 2 December 1859 – 29 March 1891) was a French post-Impressionist artist. He devised the painting techniques known as chromoluminarism and pointillism and used conté crayon for drawings on paper with a rough su ...
's most famous work.
A leading example of
pointillist technique, executed on a large canvas, it is a founding work of the
neo-impressionist movement. Seurat's composition includes a number of
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...
ians at a park on the banks of the
River Seine
)
, mouth_location = Le Havre/Honfleur
, mouth_coordinates =
, mouth_elevation =
, progression =
, river_system = Seine basin
, basin_size =
, tributaries_left = Yonne, Loing, Eure, Risle
, tributari ...
. It is in the collection of the
Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...
.
Background
In 1879,
Georges Seurat
Georges Pierre Seurat ( , , ; 2 December 1859 – 29 March 1891) was a French post-Impressionist artist. He devised the painting techniques known as chromoluminarism and pointillism and used conté crayon for drawings on paper with a rough su ...
enlisted as a soldier in the French army and arrived back home in 1880. Later, he ran a small painter's studio in Paris, and in 1883 showed his work publicly for the first time. The following year, Seurat began to work on ''La Grande Jatte'' and exhibited the painting in the spring of 1886 with the
Impressionists
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating ...
. With ''La Grande Jatte'', Seurat was immediately acknowledged as the leader of a new and rebellious form of Impressionism called
Neo-Impressionism
Neo-Impressionism is a term coined by French art critic Félix Fénéon in 1886 to describe an art movement founded by Georges Seurat. Seurat's most renowned masterpiece, ''A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte'', marked the begi ...
.
Seurat painted ''A Sunday Afternoon'' between May 1884 and March 1885, and from October 1885 to May 1886, focusing meticulously on the
landscape
A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or man-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes the ...
of the park. He reworked the original and completed numerous preliminary drawings and oil sketches. He sat in the park, creating numerous sketches of the various figures in order to perfect their form. He concentrated on issues of colour, light, and
form
Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens.
Form also refers to:
*Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data
* ...
. The painting is approximately in size.
Inspired by
optical
Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultravio ...
effects and
perception
Perception () is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous syste ...
inherent in the color theories of
Michel Eugène Chevreul
Michel Eugène Chevreul (31 August 1786 – 9 April 1889) was a French chemist and centenarian whose work influenced several areas in science, medicine, and art. His early work with animal fats revolutionized soap and candle manufacturing and le ...
,
Ogden Rood and others, Seurat adapted this scientific research to his painting.
Seurat contrasted miniature dots or small brushstrokes of colors that when unified optically in the human eye were perceived as a single shade or hue. He believed that this form of painting, called
Divisionism
Divisionism, also called chromoluminarism, was the characteristic style in Neo-Impressionist painting defined by the separation of colors into individual dots or patches which interacted optically..Homer, William I. ''Seurat and the Science of ...
at the time (a term he preferred)
but now known as
Pointillism
Pointillism (, ) is a technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are applied in patterns to form an image.
Georges Seurat and Paul Signac developed the technique in 1886, branching from Impressionism. The term "Pointillism" ...
, would make the colors more brilliant and powerful than standard brushstrokes. The use of dots of almost uniform size came in the second year of his work on the painting, 1885–86. To make the experience of the painting even more vivid, he surrounded it with a frame of painted dots, which in turn he enclosed with a pure white, wooden frame, which is how the painting is exhibited today at the
Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...
.
The
Island of la Grande Jatte is located at the very gates of
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...
, lying in the
Seine
)
, mouth_location = Le Havre/ Honfleur
, mouth_coordinates =
, mouth_elevation =
, progression =
, river_system = Seine basin
, basin_size =
, tributaries_left = Yonne, Loing, Eure, Risle
, tributa ...
between
Neuilly and
Levallois-Perret
Levallois-Perret () is a commune in the Hauts-de-Seine department and Île-de-France region of north-central France. It lies some from the centre of Paris in the north-western suburbs of the French capital. It is the most densely populated ...
, a short distance from where
La Défense
La Défense () is a major business district in France, located west of the city limits of Paris. It is part of the Paris metropolitan area in the Île-de-France region, located in the department of Hauts-de-Seine in the communes of Courbev ...
business district currently stands. Although for many years it was an industrial site, it is today the site of a public garden and a housing development. When Seurat began the painting in 1884, the island was a bucolic retreat far from the urban center.
The painting was first exhibited at the eighth (and last) Impressionist exhibition in May 1886, then in August 1886, dominating the second Salon of the
Société des Artistes Indépendants
The Société des Artistes Indépendants (''Society of Independent Artists'') or Salon des Indépendants was formed in Paris on 29 July 1884. The association began with the organization of massive exhibitions in Paris, choosing the slogan "''sans ...
, of which Seurat had been a founder in 1884.
[ Seurat was extremely disciplined, always serious, and private to the point of secretiveness—for the most part, steering his own steady course. As a painter, he wanted to make a difference in the history of art and with ''La Grande Jatte'', many say that he succeeded.
]
Interpretation
Seurat's painting was a mirror impression of his own painting, ''Bathers at Asnières
''Bathers at Asnières'' (french: Une Baignade, Asnières) is an 1884 oil on canvas painting by French artist Georges Pierre Seurat, the first of his two masterpieces on the monumental scale. The canvas is of a suburban, placid Parisian riversi ...
'', completed shortly before, in 1884. Whereas the bathers in that earlier painting are doused in light, almost every figure on ''La Grande Jatte'' appears to be cast in shadow, either under trees or an umbrella, or from another person. For Parisians, Sunday was the day to escape the heat of the city and head for the shade of the trees and the cool breezes that came off the river. And at first glance, the viewer sees many different people relaxing in a park by the river. On the right, a fashionable couple, the woman with the sunshade and the man in his top hat, are on a stroll. On the left, another woman who is also well dressed extends her fishing pole over the water. There is a small man with the black hat and thin cane looking at the river, and a white dog with a brown head, a woman knitting, a man playing a trumpet, two soldiers standing at attention as the musician plays, and a woman hunched under an orange umbrella. Seurat also painted a man with a pipe, a woman under a parasol in a boat filled with rowers, and a couple admiring their infant child.
Some of the characters are doing curious things. The lady on the right side has a pet monkey
A pet monkey is a monkey kept as a pet. The practice of keeping monkeys as pets is controversial.
Monkeys have often been favorite pets of queens such as Catherine de' Medici and Henrietta Maria, wife of Charles I.
Ship's monkeys
When the Britis ...
on a leash. A lady on the left near the river bank is fishing. The area was known at the time as being a place to procure prostitute
Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in Sex work, sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, n ...
s among the bourgeoisie, a likely allusion of the otherwise odd "fishing" rod. In the painting's center stands a little girl dressed in white (who is not in a shadow), who stares directly at the viewer of the painting. This may be interpreted as someone who is silently questioning the audience: "What will become of these people and their class?" Seurat paints their prospects bleakly, cloaked as they are in shadow and suspicion of sin.
In the 1950s, historian and Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch
Ernst Simon Bloch (; July 8, 1885 – August 4, 1977; pseudonyms: Karl Jahraus, Jakob Knerz) was a German Marxist philosopher. Bloch was influenced by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Karl Marx, as well as by apocalyptic and religious thinkers ...
drew social and political significance from Seurat's ''La Grande Jatte''. The historian's focal point was Seurat's mechanical use of the figures and what their static nature said about French society at the time. Afterward, the work received heavy criticism by many that centered on the artist's mathematical and robotic interpretation of modernity in Paris.[
According to historian of Modernism William R. Everdell:
The border of the painting is, unusually, in inverted color, as if the world around them is also slowly inverting from the way of life they have known. Seen in this context, the boy who bathes on the other side of the river bank at Asnières appears to be calling out to them, as if to say, "We are the future. Come and join us".]
Painting materials
Seurat painted the ''La Grande Jatte'' in three distinct stages. In the first stage, which was started in 1884, he mixed his paints from several individual pigments and was still using dull earth pigments such as ochre
Ochre ( ; , ), or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the colours produced ...
or burnt sienna
Sienna (from it, terra di Siena, meaning "Siena earth") is an earth pigment containing iron oxide and manganese oxide. In its natural state, it is yellowish brown and is called raw sienna. When heated, it becomes a reddish brown and is calle ...
. In the second stage, during 1885 and 1886, Seurat dispensed with the earth pigments and also limited the number of individual pigments in his paints. This change in his palette was due to his application of the advanced color theories of his time. His intention was to paint small dots or strokes of pure color that would then mix on the retina
The retina (from la, rete "net") is the innermost, light-sensitive layer of tissue of the eye of most vertebrates and some molluscs. The optics of the eye create a focused two-dimensional image of the visual world on the retina, which then ...
of the beholder to achieve the desired color impression instead of the usual practice of mixing individual pigments.
Seurat's palette consisted of the usual pigments of his time such as cobalt blue
Cobalt blue is a blue pigment made by sintering cobalt(II) oxide with aluminum(III) oxide (alumina) at 1200 °C. Chemically, cobalt blue pigment is cobalt(II) oxide-aluminium oxide, or cobalt(II) aluminate, CoAl2O4. Cobalt blue is lighter ...
, emerald green
Varieties of the color green may differ in hue, chroma (also called saturation or intensity) or lightness (or value, tone, or brightness), or in two or three of these qualities. Variations in value are also called tints and shades, a tint b ...
and vermilion
Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since ancient history, antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its correspondi ...
. Additionally, he used the then new pigment zinc yellow (zinc chromate
Zinc chromate, Zn Cr O4, is a chemical compound containing the chromate anion, appearing as odorless yellow powder or yellow-green crystals, but, when used for coatings, pigments are often added. It is used industrially in chromate conversion c ...
), predominantly for yellow highlights in the sunlit grass in the middle of the painting but also in mixtures with orange and blue pigments. In the century and more since the painting's completion, the zinc yellow has darkened to brown—a color degeneration that was already showing in the painting in Seurat's lifetime. The discoloration of the originally bright yellow zinc yellow (zinc chromate) to a brownish color is due to the chemical reaction of the chromate ions to orange-colored dichromate ions. In the third stage during 1888–89 Seurat added the colored borders to his composition.
The results of investigation into the discoloration of this painting have been combined with further research into natural aging of paints to digitally rejuvenate the painting.
Acquisition by the Art Institute of Chicago
In 1923, Frederic Bartlett was appointed trustee of the Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...
. He and his second wife, Helen Birch Bartlett, loaned their collection
Collection or Collections may refer to:
* Cash collection, the function of an accounts receivable department
* Collection (church), money donated by the congregation during a church service
* Collection agency, agency to collect cash
* Collectio ...
of French Post-Impressionist and Modernist art to the museum. It was Mrs. Bartlett who had an interest in French and avant-garde artists and influenced her husband's collecting tastes. ''Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte'' was purchased on the advice of the Art Institute of Chicago's curatorial staff in 1924.
In conceptual artist Don Celender
Don Celender (1931 – March 3, 2005) was an American conceptual artist and professor. Celender, who began producing art in the late 1960s, used surveys extensively in his work. He would send questionnaires to members of the public, academics, ar ...
's 1974–75 book ''Observation and Scholarship Examination for Art Historians, Museum Directors, Artists, Dealers and Collectors'', it is claimed that the institute paid $24,000 for the work (over $354,000 in 2018 dollars).
In 1958, the painting was loaned for the only time: to the Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
in New York. On 15 April 1958, a fire there, which killed one person on the second floor of the museum, forced the evacuation of the painting, which had been on a floor above the fire, to the Whitney Museum
The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude ...
, which adjoined MoMA at the time.
In popular culture
The May 1976 issue of ''Playboy
''Playboy'' is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother.
K ...
'' featured Nancy Cameron— Playmate of the Month in January 1974—on its cover, superimposed on the painting in similar style. The often hidden bunny logo was disguised as one of the millions of dots.
The painting is the basis for the 1984 Broadway musical ''Sunday in the Park with George
''Sunday in the Park with George'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine. It was inspired by the French pointillist painter Georges Seurat's painting ''A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatt ...
'' by Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim (; March 22, 1930November 26, 2021) was an American composer and lyricist. One of the most important figures in twentieth-century musical theater, Sondheim is credited for having "reinvented the American musical" with sho ...
and James Lapine
James Elliot Lapine (born January 10, 1949) is an American stage director, playwright, screenwriter, and librettist. He has won the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical three times, for ''Into the Woods'', ''Falsettos'', and '' Passion''. He ha ...
, which tells a fictionalized story of the painting's creation. Subsequently, the painting is sometimes referred to by the misnomer ''"Sunday in the Park"''.
The painting is prominently featured in the 1986 comedy film ''Ferris Bueller's Day Off
''Ferris Bueller's Day Off'' is a 1986 American teen comedy film written, co-produced, and directed by John Hughes and co-produced by Tom Jacobson. The film stars Matthew Broderick, Mia Sara, and Alan Ruck with supporting roles by Jennifer Grey ...
'', in a scene later parodied, among others, in '' Looney Tunes: Back in Action'', ''Family Guy
''Family Guy'' is an American animated sitcom originally conceived and created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The show centers around the Griffin family, Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter Griff ...
'', and '' Muppet Babies''.
In the ''Simpsons'' episode "Mom and Pop Art
"Mom and Pop Art" is the nineteenth episode of the tenth season of the American animated television series ''The Simpsons''. It was first aired on the Fox network in the United States on April 11, 1999. In this episode, Homer inadvertently becomes ...
" (10x19), Barney Gumble offers to pay for a beer with a handmade reproduction of the painting. The painting is also parodied in the picnic scene at the end of the episode " Super Franchise Me" (26x3).
In Topiary Park
Topiary Park is a public park and garden in Columbus, Ohio's Discovery District (Columbus, Ohio), Discovery District. The park's topiary garden, officially the Topiary Garden at Old Deaf School Park, is designed to depict figures from Georges S ...
(formerly Old Deaf School Park) in Columbus, Ohio
Columbus () is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the 14th-most populous city in the U.S., the second-most populous city in the Midwest, after Chicago, and t ...
, sculptor James T. Mason re-created the painting in topiary
Topiary is the horticultural practice of training perennial plants by clipping the foliage and twigs of trees, shrubs and subshrubs to develop and maintain clearly defined shapes, whether geometric or fanciful. The term also refers to plants w ...
form; the installation was completed in 1989.
The painting was the inspiration for a commemorative poster printed for the 1993 Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix
The Detroit Grand Prix (currently branded as the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix presented by Lear Corporation for sponsorship reasons) is an IndyCar Series race weekend held on a temporary circuit in Detroit, Michigan. The race has been held from ...
, with racing cars and the Detroit skyline added.
In 2011, the cast of the US version of ''The Office
''The Office'' is a mockumentary sitcom created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, first made in the United Kingdom, then Germany, and subsequently the United States. It has since been remade in ten other countries.
The original series of ...
'' re-created the painting for a poster to promote the show's seventh-season finale.
The cover photo of the June 2014 edition of ''San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
'' magazine, "The Oakland Issue: Special Edition", features a scene on the shore of Lake Merritt
Lake Merritt is a large tidal lagoon in the center of Oakland, California, just east of Downtown. It is surrounded by parkland and city neighborhoods. It is historically significant as the United States' first official wildlife refuge, designate ...
that re-creates the poses of the figures in Seurat's painting.
The painting is featured in the ''Animal Crossing
is a social simulation video game series developed and published by Nintendo. The series was conceptualized and created by Katsuya Eguchi and Hisashi Nogami. In ''Animal Crossing'', the player character is a human who lives in a village inhabi ...
'' video game series as a purchasable furniture item under the name the "Calm Painting".
On December 2, 2021, the painting was used as part of a homage to Georges Seurat by Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
in one of its doodles.
Related works by Seurat
File:Study for La Grande Jatte, Georges Seurat, 1884.jpg, ''Study for La Grande Jatte''
File:Georges Seurat 023.jpg, ''Die Insel La Grande Jatte mit Ausflüglern'', 1884
File:Georges Seurat 051.jpg, ''Paysage et personnages'', 1884–85
File:Georges Seurat 038.jpg, ''Groupe de personnages'', 1884–85
File:Georges Seurat 034.jpg, ''Esquisse d'ensemble'', 1884–85
File:Georges Seurat 035.jpg, ''Femmes au bord de l'eau'', 1885–86
File:Georges Seurat - Les Poseuses.jpg, ''Models
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
'' (''Les Poseuses'') 1886-1888
See also
*List of paintings by Georges Seurat
This is a list of paintings by Georges Seurat (2 December 1859 - 29 March 1891), a Post-Impressionist/Neo-Impressionist
Neo-Impressionism is a term coined by French art critic Félix Fénéon in 1886 to describe an art movement founded by Georg ...
*100 Great Paintings
''100 Great Paintings'' is a British television series broadcast in 1980 on BBC 2, devised by Edwin Mullins.http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/series/11652 13 January 2007 He chose 20 thematic groups, such as war, the ...
References
Further reading
*
* William R. Everdell, ''The First Moderns: Profiles in the Origins of Twentieth Century Thought'' (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).
*
External links
Seurat and the Making of ''La Grande Jatte''
''La Grande Jatte'' – Inspiration, Analysis and Critical Reception
A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884
at The Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mill ...
Georges Seurat, 1859–1891
MoMA exhibition catalog
Georges Seurat, ''Sunday Afternoon at La Grande Jatte'', ColourLex
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, A
1886 paintings
Dogs in art
Monkeys in art
Musical instruments in art
Paintings by Georges Seurat
Paintings in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago
Post-impressionist paintings
Ships in art