The first ever Impressionist exhibition took place in 1874, between April 15th - May 15th, when the former studio of Nadar, in Paris, became the stage for a show which will make art history. After being rejected form the official Saloon several times, artists such as Degas, Pissarro, Cezanne or Berthe Morisot founded the Societate Anonime des Artistes and put together this free opportunity of presenting their new vision and creations to the public. They wanted to to art another way, far from the official norms and regulations, a free art, a form of way which expressed their vission.
You could visit the exhibition for just one franc, while the beautiful catalogue was just half of this amount. Not too much, maybe the price of a snack and the exhibition remained open until 10 o clock in the evening, as it was meant to also be accessible for the masses, the working man, those who had to work hard all day long. Not that any of those ever came to see the show, but the idea of atracting the masses to new art was a generous and modern one.
There were also several rules to be able to exhibit at this very first Impressionist show. You could exhibit at least two works - most of the artists exhibited many more - the works on display being selected by a commision of 15 members of the Society. All in a very democratic way.. You could also become a member of the Societe Anonime for just 65 francs a year. According to the organisers, ten percent of every sale made at the show would be used to cover the expensures. The works on display were put together in alphabetical order, also according to the side. It was Renoir himself that had to put them up on the walls, as the artists didn't bother to show. So the master became a worker, much to his amusement.
The show, although today is considered to be a major moment in 19th century art, wasn't a great success at that time. In the first day only 175 people came, and by the end only about 3500 visitors had found the time to discover new art. It wasn't too bad, surely it wasn't as good as the artists had hoped. But the sales were much, much lower, and only Sisley was the lucky one, as he managed to sell a landscape for around 1000 francs. All in all, at the end of the show the sales were only of 3500 francs, which was low by any standards.
The main gain for the Impressionist movement was not financial, but the exposure that the event had in newspapers and magazines at that time. And much to their surprise the reviews weren't bad, they weren't bad at all, and it seemed that the public and art critics were rather friendly towards the new style. Still, not all of them were particularly impressed by the show and the Impressionist ideas. One in particular, Louis Leroy, would make art history, as much as he couldn't imagine it. It was him who coined the term of "impressionist" art, which will become a noble trademark and the name of a period in European art. Still, in his article dedicated to the show, he was only trying to make fun of the artists. Oh, the little ironies of history.
September 2008
