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Realism in the 19th Century
Or the Consequences of a New Relationship to Reality on the Visual Arts
The label 'realist' is applied to diverse works such as Roman statuary, Renaissance paintings, Russian Constructivist sculptures, and New Realist assemblages. Given the fluidity of the term, it is worth asking what Realism meant in the 19th century.
Chapter 1 - The Possibilities of Realism
Being realist requires an understanding, an access to reality. However, there are times when this access is deemed difficult, if not obsolete. In his Republic, Plato considered realist arts that deceived people to be impossible, even detestable. Much later, Structuralists and Post-structuralists from Saussure to Lacan considered access to reality to be an illusion, entangled as they were in the symbolic world of language. But what about the people of the 19th century?
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Chapter 2 - The Philosophical and Intellectual Context
The nineteenth century was the century of scientism par excellence. Religion, history and literature became sciences of reality in their own right under the influence of thinkers such as Renan, Taine, Champfleury, Zola and Flaubert. Like their peers, artists were obliged to depict only what was visible and to experiment with it. They had to try to become impersonal without being compared to photographers or daguerreotypists, and to distance themselves from their models. From Courbet to Millet, everyone had to experiment with this 'corner of nature seen through a temperament'.
Chapter 3 - The Problematic Representation of Death
Subscribing to the realist credo that only what is observed can be represented, religious painting focused on scenes of worship rather than divine imagery (Jules Breton, Jules Bastien-Lepage, and Alphonse Legros). A new genre also emerged: the almost medical representation of death. Manet's depiction of The Dead Christ appears to have been taken directly from a morgue, while cemetery burial scenes resemble instant photography.
Chapter 4 - "Get with the Times!", A Call for Rallying
Which subject best fits Daumier's imperative, 'One must be of one's time!'? Although the realist painter could have produced mythological paintings in the photographic reconstruction style typical of Lawrence Alma-Tadema or Gustav Klimt in his early years, he mostly chose to depict everyday life. Other artists who depicted everyday life include Courbet, who painted the people of Ornans, and Millet, who painted peasants in works such as Man with a Hoe and Gleaners. Gueldry also painted factory workers.
Bibliography
Linda Nochlin, Realism, Style and Civilisation, Penguin books,1973
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