Impression, Sunrise

Impression, Sunrise (French: Impression, soleil levant) is an 1872 painting by Claude Monet first shown at what would become known as the "Exhibition of the Impressionists" in Paris in April, 1874. The painting is credited with inspiring the name of the Impressionist movement.

Impression, Sunrise depicts the port of Le Havre, Monet's hometown. It is now displayed at the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris.

History
Monet visited his hometown of Le Havre in the Northwest of France in 1872 and proceeded to create a series of works depicting the port. The six painted canvases depict the port "during dawn, day, dusk, and dark and from varying viewpoints, some from the water itself and others from a hotel room looking down over the port".Impression, Sunrise became the most famous in the series after being debuted in April 1874 in Paris at an exhibition by the group "Painters, Sculptors, Engravers etc. Inc." Among thirty participants, the exhibition was led by Monet, Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Alfred Sisley, and showed over two hundred works that were seen by about 4,000 people, including some rather unsympathetic critics.

In 1985 the painting was stolen from the Musée Marmottan Monet by Philippe Jamin and Youssef Khimoun. It was recovered and returned to the museum in 1990, and put back on display in 1991.

Subject and interpretation
Impression, Sunrise depicts the port of Le Havre at sunrise, the two small rowboats in the foreground and the red Sun being the focal elements. In the middle ground, more fishing boats are included, while in the background on the left side of the painting are clipper ships with tall masts. Behind them are other misty shapes that "are not trees but smokestacks of pack boats and steamships, while on the right in the distance are other masts and chimneys silhouetted against the sky." In order to show these features of industry, Monet eliminated existing houses on the left side of the jetty, leaving the background unobscured.

Following the defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, the regeneration of France was exemplified in the thriving port of Le Havre. Art historian Paul Tucker suggests that the contrast of elements like the steamboats and cranes in the background to the fishermen in the foreground represent these political implications: "Monet may have seen this painting of a highly commercial site as an answer to the postwar calls for patriotic action and an art that could lead. For while it is a poem of light and atmosphere, the painting can also be seen as an ode to the power and beauty of a revitalized France."The representation of Le Havre, hometown of Monet and a center of industry and commerce, celebrates the "renewed strength and beauty of the country... Monet's ultimate utopian statement." Art demonstrating France's revitalization, Monet's depiction of Le Havre's sunrise mirrors the renewal of France.

Style
The hazy scene of Impression, Sunrise strayed from traditional landscape painting and classic, idealized beauty. Paul Smith suggested that with this style, Monet meant to express "other beliefs about artistic quality which might be tied to the ideologies being consolidated by the emergent bourgeoisie from which he came." Loose brush strokes meant to suggest the scene rather than to mimetically represent it demonstrate the emergent Impressionist movement. In the wake of an emergent industrialization in France, this style expressed innovative individuality. Considering this, Smith claims that "Impression, Sunrise was about Monet's search for spontaneous expression, but was guided by definite and historically specific ideas about what spontaneous expression was."