Impressionists. Diaries and letters

The most striking and significant phenomenon of French painting of the last third of the 19th century was impressionism. Representatives of this current, trying to oppose themselves to classical art, were looking for their own paths and forms of creative expression. The innovation and ideas of this direction have completely changed the artistic perception of the art of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The history of the study of impressionism has more than one century. The book “Archives of Impressionism”, published in 1939 by the famous Italian artist Lionello Venturi, is a collection of valuable documents-letters of impressionist artists addressed to the Duran-Ruel Paul-their constant marshane and patron, whose biography is also included in the book. The most numerous letters of the main representatives of the group are Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir and Kamil Pissarro. Regular correspondence began in the early 1880s and continued until the death of artists. These letters highlight the most diverse aspects of the life and activities of artists: views on art, projects of new exhibitions and new works, negotiations with collectors, relations between artists themselves, descriptions of new areas visited by them in search of new motives, components of home troubles and joys experienced material difficulties. The bright individuality of the authors is manifested in the letters very clearly: Renoir"s serenity, the calm delicacy of Pissarro, the lively temperament of Monet. It is in this living carnal fabric, woven from everyday events, that a clear reliable picture of the life and creativity of wonderful painters, which has passed the difficult way of struggle for new art