Recently I had a nice discussion with Mitch Albala, a wonderful painter who knows quite a bit about Impressionism. If you don’t know of Mitch, check out his website, his work, and his workshops. He may be the teacher near you that you are looking for. Also check out his book, Landscape Painting, which is certainly one of the more thoughtful and helpful treatments of the subject.

What prompted the discussion was the manner in which Monet can be seen painting in a Youtube video. In this video we see Monet make a mark on the canvas. He then looks at his water lilies and makes a mark again, and so on, repeating this rapid succession of looking and making marks for quite some time. On his website, Mitch comments:

“Because Monet’s approach to color was so interpretive and imaginative—not at all literal—I imagined that he would have spent more time thinking about the colors on his canvas and less about the colors in front of him.”

I had a different take on what Monet was doing. Yes, Monet’s water lily paintings are certainly “not at all literal” but in Monet’s case (and in the context of Impressionism more generally) I believe that he arrives at this non-literal application of paint not out of imagination or thinking. In fact, Monet tells us that he paints only what he sees. The key in understanding what Monet is doing turns on what one means by “literal:” when Monet looks at water lilies (according to Monet) he is not seeing water lilies. This is what non-literal means in the context of Impressionism: don’t see the thing (with a name, the literal) you are looking at. Instead see only visual elements: line, tone, and color.

And why might Monet translate everything he sees into visual elements? Because he is a visual artist and once his field of vision becomes visual stuff (or “sensations”) he is in a position to respond emotionally to what he sees. Or more simply, he is in a better position to be moved. This is the basis of the marks that one might call non-literal. They do not arise out of thought-driven expression, but out of feeling-driven expression, which carries with it that ineluctable, visceral twinge.

The activity of painting, for an Impressionist, is about the “rendering” (Monet) or “realizing” (Cèzanne) of one’s feelings in response to these “sensations” (something that Monet called “instantaneity.”) Pissarro tells us that this is the crux of both of painting and freedom. Hence, the constant looking is not about description – getting the pond with water lilies to look like a pond with water lilies, but about opening oneself to the stream of energy of color that, as Monet tells us, is “ever changing” and then using that surge of feeling in the act of making marks. The looking and the making of marks melt into one, much in the way music and dance melt into one. Monet is getting a rush, a “dream world” as he calls it. The rush is then “rendered” (I think Cèzanne’s word “realized” is a better explanation) through the making of marks.

Here’s the kicker: if Monet had to think and evaluate the marks as he made them on the canvas – imagine or invent them for example – the spell would be broken. There would be no dream world. He would be constantly stuck in a conscious-critical mode. Each mark would be made in anticipation of a result. Whereas Monet is not looking for results; nor does he know where the painting is going. The anxiety of getting it right disappears. He is painting, as he says, as “the bird sings.” Or to paraphrase Casals, he is playing the music, not the notes. He has crossed over into “enchantment” (a word Monet uses regularly) that carries him, unconsciously, along.

If one looks for results as one paints, then one is prioritizing the evaluation of the result over the rush that comes from playing the music without consideration of the results. This is called production. And when one produces a product there are always other sets of eyes, other needs, considerations, and schedules that displace one’s own. This is precisely the “tyranny” that the Impressionists inveighed against; which is not to say that Monet didn’t compromise his process from time to time and paint for the approval of the Salon jury. But when he did he was quite aware about the compromise, noting (as I have previously) that when he painted as the birds sing (i.e., not looking for results) the Salon jury would reject it, he believed, because it was “too Monet.”

In Part II, I will explore this a bit further by following closely what are Monet’s own descriptions and explanations of the painting process. In Part III, I will come back to a theme that I repeat, ad nauseum for some I suppose, but which must be repeated because it diverges so completely from the contemporary assumptions that seem to govern painting and that is this: while a picture results, painting is not about making pictures. It is about becoming more of who we already are. Monet becomes more Monet (“too Monet” for the Salon) throughout his career but only when he allows the “rendering” of his feelings to drive the process. Cèzanne becomes more Cèzanne as he allows the “realization” of his feelings to drive the process. Pissarro becomes more Pissarro as he allows his own personal response to the “sensation” drive the process. And the paintings happen along the way, as does the non-literal appearance. Marks that appear non-literal are non-literal because they are very much a by-product of a non-conscious, dreamlike enchantment. Bottom line: you want to be lose and non-literal? Then don’t look for or worry about the results. The descriptive element is only a prompt, a point of departure. The non-literal dimension, the dimension that moves people, that keeps people looking at the thing for years, is about you, is about what moved you.

Painting freely to get down to who you are, as opposed to trying to get specific results for some external end, was the entire point of Impressionism. But while this “becoming” for the artist may be “dreamlike,” incredibly fulfilling, and joyful even, it is also riddled with torment. Or as Renoir put it, the process that contributed to his growth was “a gentle madness.” So in Part III I will explain why this is so, and why this joy, attendant with a kind of torment, defined Monet’s life and the life of so many great artists.