IMPRESSIONIST PAINTING:
ITS GENESIS AND DEVELOPMENT
A STUDY · MAX LIEBERMANN
PREFACE
IT may perhaps be interesting to the readers of thisbook to give a short account of its origin. From theearliest days of my pupilage to art I had been instinctivelydrawn towards the paintings of Turner, Corot,Constable, Bonington, and Watts, with an intenseadmiration for their manner in viewing, and methods ofrecreating, nature upon their canvases; and in later years I had beenfascinated by the works of more modern artists, such as La Thangue,George Clausen, Edward Stott, and Robert Meyerheim. In 1891,a student in Paris, I found myself face to face with a beautifuldevelopment of landscape painting, which was quite new to me.“Impressionism,” together with its numerous progeny of eccentricoffshoots, was at the time causing a great furore in the schools.Curiously enough I had been charged with copying Monet’s stylelong before I had seen his actual work, so that my conversion intoan enthusiastic Impressionist was short, in fact, an instantaneousprocess.
Since then I have endeavoured, by precept and by example, topreach the doctrine of Impressionism, particularly in England, whereit is so little known and appreciated. It has always seemed to meastonishing that an art which has shown such magnificent proofs ofvirility, which has long been accepted at its true value on theContinent and in Americ