The Barbizon School: The Counter-Romantic Revolution
The Barbizon School: The Counter-Romantic Revolution
How a small group of French painters revolutionised Romantic landscape painting, helped us appreciate natural beauty, and paved the way for Impressionism.
Introduction
The name “Barbizon School” refers to a group of French painters who gathered in the French town of Barbizon in the first half of the 19th century. The most famous names associated with this school are Jean-François Millet (1814–1875), Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796–1875), Narcisse Virgilio Díaz (1807–1876), and Théodore Rousseau (1812–1867).
Their goal was to depict nature accurately. They were not interested in sitting in their study in Paris painting Greek gods; instead, they wanted to be outside, capturing nature in the plain air. In this sense, they should be considered among the first naturalists of the modern era.
The Barbizon School of Art was a revolutionary movement. It contended with the Romantic tradition of the early 19th century and the French academic movement and reimagined the way landscapes were made.
In the following essay, we will delve deep into the main characteristics of this unique art movement, which significantly affected later art movements such as Impressionism.
Let us begin by examining the most well-known painting attributed to the Barbizon School, “The Gleaners” by Millet.
Peasant Life
(The Gleaners, Jean-François Millet, 1857)
While “The Gleaners” by Millet is often associated with the Barbizon School, it's important to note that the painting's focus on peasant life is more characteristic of Millet's personal thematic interests and had a stronger influence on artists like Gustave Courbet (1819–1877) than on the Barbizon movement as a whole. Nevertheless, its execution embodies key aspects of the Barbizon approach to art, particularly its naturalistic depiction of rural settings.
"The Gleaners" is a painting that depicts three peasant women gathering wheat from the ground, which was a common sight in rural Europe of those times. The painting showcases the laborious task that the peasants had to undertake on a regular basis, and the bleakness of their lives. The painting has no happy faces or cheerful colours, instead, it portrays the reality of the situation. The rough textures and pale green and brown monochromatic colours in the painting also emphasise the rough nature of manual labour and the harshness of the environment.
The composition is the most significant aspect of this painting. Millet's choice to position the three ladies in the centre made this artwork so renowned. Millet treated these working women as primary characters, while in the French society of that era, they were considered secondary characters.
It’s a very strong statement: “Instead of painting Greek gods in the studio, I’m going to a rural village to depict wheat gleaners”. For conventional artists and critics, this was outrageous. It's a blatant departure from the mainstream. Instead of smooth, colourful, and beautiful goddesses and nymphs, Millet showed rough, monochromatic, and ugly peasants.
Indeed, the Barbizonians were poorly received by the French mainstream. This sentiment foreshadowed the anti-academy and anti-salon ’revolution,’ which is a paramount characteristic of the Impressionist movement. I explore this in depth in "The Impressionist Revolution,"
(Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Pesant Wedding, 1568)
Millet's decision to depict peasants gathering wheat harked back to the tradition of Dutch and Flemish genre art, notably by Peter Breughel the Elder (1525–1569) and his followers. However, the Barbizon painters primarily focused on capturing the rural scenery around Barbizon, with peasants often serving as secondary elements within their landscapes rather than the main subjects.
Unlike Breughel and the later Realist Courbet, the Barbizon painters were not particularly interested in the social or political aspects of peasant life. Instead, they sought to capture the natural beauty and atmosphere of the rural landscape.
(The Stone Breakers, Gustave Courbet, 1849)
Courbet, in contrast, was deeply interested in the lives and work of the lower classes, often depicting French rural life with a political edge. While Courbet was influenced by Barbizon painters like Millet, his broader aesthetic tradition encompassed more controversial and confrontational themes.
Though "The Gleaners" is a significant work within the Barbizon School, it does not fully represent the typical Barbizon focus on nature. Interestingly, this painting had a more substantial impact on subsequent movements such as Realism, led by Courbet, and early Impressionism. In "Courbet vs. Renoir," I analyse Courbet's unique perspective and how his themes differed from those of other artists of his time.
The Romantic Connection
(Rocky Landscape in the Elbe Sandstone Mountains, Caspar David Friedrich, 1823)
An art movement centred around the landscape genre would not have been possible without the great 19th-century landscapists, such as Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840) and John Constable (1776–1837), who will be discussed shortly. Before their time, landscapes were considered a lesser genre with no significant importance. However, it was in nature that these great artists found the place to express the deepest human values.
The landscape was transformed from a nice piece of decoration one could hang on their walls to a platform on which painters could express universal ideas. Through the Romantic landscapists, the landscape became a platform for artists to talk about God, man's relationship with nature, man's relationship with his fellow man, the possibility of achieving one's dreams and aspirations, and many other highly abstract and universal ideas.
It was only thanks to the Romantic landscapists that the Barbizon School was possible. The Barbizonians, however, rejected the Romantic view of the landscape as a platform to convey universal issues. Interestingly, what the Barbizonians did was essentially bring the landscape back to the place it held before the Romantics, that is, purely aesthetic depictions of nature.
Apart from a few exceptions, such as "The Gleaners," the Barbizonians minimized the landscape. They saw the portrayal of nature as an end in itself and not as a means to a higher end, as the Romantics did.
With its deep philosophical undertones, the Romantic landscape genre represents a pivotal era in art history. I offer a broader analysis of this period in "Landscape Painting and Its Power," where the transformative role of landscapes in art is examined in further detail.
(Wivenhoe Park, John Constable, 1816)
A comprehensive discussion of the Barbizon school cannot be done without mentioning Constable. Constable was an artist who created during the peak of the Romantic movement and the Industrial Revolution and chose to capture scenes of rural England.
However, the difference between Constable and the Barbizonians lies in how they view nature. Constable had a nostalgic and Romantic view of nature, considering rural England as an idyllic subject. He portrayed happy scenes that reminded him of his childhood in rural Suffolk. He saw these landscapes as the ideal place to be. Thus, Constable portrayed nature from a Romantic perspective.
On the other hand, the Barbizonians aimed to capture the nature surrounding the forests of Barbizon as it was, without any idealisation or addressing of universal and abstract ideas. Thus, they eliminate the Romantic, idealistic element in Constable's work, and we're left with a camera-like capture of the natural realm.
The Barbizon School can be seen as a reaction against the Romantic landscape movement. While the Barbizon artists embraced the Romantic idea of elevating landscape painting to a major art genre, they portrayed their landscapes without idealisation or addressing universal and abstract ideas. This effectively reversed the Romantic notion of elevating the landscape to a more decorative role. However, the Barbizon landscapes still held significant importance and influence, suggesting that the Romantic elevation of the landscape might have been irreversible. Aesthetically, the Barbizon artists celebrated the importance of landscapes, but their portrayal of landscapes contradicted the Romantic style.
Raw Nature
(The Edge of the Forest at Les Monts-Girard, Fontainebleau, Narcisse Virgilio Díaz, 1868)
The Barbizonians were not just painters but also skilled printmakers with a particular speciality in etching. Their etchings were characterised by rough textures, which they used to add a rough textorial effect to their paintings. The painting by Díaz above is a great example of this technique. The roughness of the textures added depth and dimension to the painting, creating a sense of realism that accurately reflected the raw and rugged beauty of nature.
The Barbizon painters' depictions of nature were unique in that they portrayed it in its natural state, with all its imperfections and ruggedness. Unlike Constable and other painters of the Romantic tradition, who often depicted idealised and picturesque landscapes, the Barbizon painters showed the true essence of nature through the textures of the sky, trees, and grass, as well as their mastery of light. By using textures to create the illusion of bark, leaves, and skies, and by mastering the use of light, they could realistically convey the feeling of being out in nature.
(Les Chênes d'Apremont, Théodore Rousseau, 1852)
The example created by Rousseau is a wonderful illustration of the highly realistic depiction of light that the Barbizon School of artists perfected in their art. Rousseau's painting beautifully captures the sun rays hitting the tree and creating shadows below, as well as the smallest shadows in the grass on the right side and below the cows. This focus on capturing a specific moment of light greatly influenced the Impressionist movement, where Claude Monet (1840–1926) and other Impressionists made light in itself a subject of their work.
The nuanced treatment of light, which became central to the Impressionist movement, is a theme I discuss extensively in the section "Light as a Subject" from "The Impressionist Revolution."
(The Clearing, Narcisse Virgilio Díaz, 1870)
“The Clearing” is my favourite Barbizon painting. The photo doesn’t do it justice. I remember bumping into this work in the wonderful Leipzig Museum of Painting, where it resides, and I was astounded by how the light pops out of the painting. It’s visible from the other side of the room. This represents the epitome of the light mastery shown in many Barbizon paintings, especially those of Díaz. Experiencing the vibrancy of the colours and light is the greatest joy I have gained from these Barbizon paintings.
If their mission was to capture the raw sense of being inside the woods, they have definitely achieved that. Notice that this was made in the field. The Brabizonians were pioneers of ‘en plein air’ painting. They weren't standing in the comfort of their studies, but they ventured into these woods and faced all the challenges that standing in the woods brings. They managed to capture the rough nature and its beautiful light and green shades. This is a significant aesthetic achievement that needs to be appreciated.
The Escape Heaven
(The Pond at Gylieu, Charles-François Daubigny, 1853)
There is something special about finding value in a simple subject, such as a nearby forest. The Brabizonian painters lived during the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, which caused people to move away from village life to the city. This resulted in significant air and noise pollution in the big European cities. To escape this, the Brabizonians went to peaceful rural France to paint the shepherds, trees, and gleaners. As someone who has always lived in an urban environment, I can relate to their desire to get away from the city and go to the woods.
The Brabizonians found their escape in that small village. They lived there and went for long walks into the woods with their easels armed with browns, greens, and blues. Some may think that this is too simple of a subject for art. However, we must remember that art is a manifestation of an artist's values. For this group of painters, the woods were of great significance, or else they would not have spent so much time living and making their art there. Thus, despite their explicit naturalism, the Brabizonians have indeed recreated reality according to their metaphysical value judgements.
(Grüner See, Austria, September 2023)
In September 2023, when I was visiting Austria, I made a day trip to a lake called “Grüner See” (Green Lake). It was one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. Sitting there on a bench, surrounded by these gorgeous Austrian mountains, the tall, green trees and their breathtaking reflections on the water were so beautiful and relaxing that I thought to myself, “What more does one need?” I believe the Barbizonians managed to capture that exact feeling with their landscapes.
Conclusion
The Barbizon School has always been a challenging art movement for me to connect with. I wondered how they could ignore all the exciting things happening in the cities, factories, and trains. Also, their blatant naturalism makes their art far less interesting than their Romantic counterparts; there’s no denying that.
However, as I have experienced the beauty of nature more and more, I can understand the appeal of getting away from the city to enjoy some natural relaxation and contemplation.
The Barbizon artists took the Romantic celebration of the landscape and applied it to their simpler, naturalistic values. They revolutionised outdoor painting and significantly influenced later artist’s ability to capture light and shadow. They applied their etching technique to canvases, creating unique textures that made their landscapes appear even more realistic. The Barbizonians paved the way for the Impressionists and post-Impressionists like Van Gogh, who were greatly influenced by them.
The Barbizon School was an innovative movement, integral to our understanding of 19th-century painting. Few painters have managed to capture natural beauty as well as they have. Next time you go for a hike, take a moment to think about the Barbizonians and try to immerse yourself in the simple yet stunning subject of natural beauty.
From an art historical perspective, the Barbizon School could be seen as a particularly negative development that created trends that led to Impressionism and, by extension, Modernism. But that doesn’t change the fact that the Barbizon paintings were fundamentally based on and advocated for realism.
The debate over what precisely defines art, especially at its margins, is a complex issue that I tackle in "The Borderline Case: When Does Art Stop Being Art?" This discussion offers insights into how certain movements, including the Barbizon School, challenge our traditional perceptions of artistic boundaries.
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