The Private Lives of the Impressionists by Sue Roe

- October 02, 2019

Impressive Impressionists

Get ready for total immersion into the lives and times of the impressionists! This book brings all the paintings and facts you may have collected about the artists and puts them in a clear perspective. Following them year by year, Sue Roe explains how they found and influenced each other and how their surroundings, events, and family members played into their artwork. It’s a fascinating, in-depth look into the obstacles and struggles that confronted the shocking new painters who put ordinary people and landscapes on light-filled canvases.

This book will give you a whole new appreciation of French impressionist art and have you planning out your dream trip to museums so you can see these masterpieces with your own eyes (sigh).

WARNING: While there are several full-color pages of the impressionists’ art in the book, you may have to upgrade your phone data plan before diving in, because you’ll no doubt be burning up the minutes searching for all the paintings mentioned.

Historical Fictions

For those who prefer to dip their toes into lighter reading before diving head-on into an extensively detailed descriptions of the impressionists’ lives you may consider the following historical fictions:

I Always Loved You by Robin Oliveira about the relationship between Mary Cassatt and Edgar Degas as well as Edouard Manet and Berthe Morisot.

Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland follows Renoir’s time while painting his masterpiece by the same name as the book.

The Painted Girls by Cathy Marie Buchanan is the story of Degas’s Little Dancer Aged Fourteen statue as told through the model, Marie van Goethem and her sister’s story.

Depths of Glory by Irving Stone–A page-turning book about Camille Pissarro’s life.

Impressionists’ Paintings at the Art Institute of Chicago

In 2014, I was lucky enough to go to the Art Institute of Chicago and see many of the paintings described in Sue Roe’s book. Of course, the museum has so many other renowned works including art by Van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec, John Singer Sargent, Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Grant Wood, Matisse, Picasso, Pollock, Warhol, and on and on! There just wasn’t enough time to take it all in. We spent seven hours there and I would love to go back to see it again! Here are a few of the impressionists’ paintings we saw: