Realism: Origins, Historical Context, and French Academic Movement of the 19th Century

The Realism, artistic movement in visual arts, began in France in the second half of the 19th century with the Industrial Revolution. Realist painters rejected Romanticism, which dominated all of Europe, with its roots at the end of the 18th century.

Founded in 1648 by the King Louis XIV, the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture governed the production of art in France for nearly two centuries. Given the prominence of France in European culture at the time, the Academy established standards for art throughout the continent, providing studio training for young talents and recognizing artistic achievements in its exhibitions at the Salon.

The highest form of art established by the Academy in a conference of 1668 was historical painting: the representation on a large scale of a narrative, typically extracted from classical mythology, the Bible, literature, or the annals of human achievements. Only the most famous painters were allowed to paint in this genre, and their works were the most celebrated by the Academy. Descending in importance in the hierarchy of genres are portrait, genre scenes (the representation of peasants or unimportant people), landscape (the representation of living nature), and still life.

Stimulated by archaeological discoveries in Greece and Italy in the mid 18th century and Enlightenment ideals of reason and order, Neoclassicism became the mode of excellence for the history of painting at the end of 1700. Neoclassical painting, exemplified in the work of Jacques-Louis David, used classical references, compositional techniques, and arrangements to comment on contemporary events.

In response to Neoclassicism, the Industrial Revolution, and the rationalization of Illuminism of life and society, Romanticism embraced intense emotion and irrationality and exotic themes as more authentic sources for artistic creativity. Instead of beautifully ordered outdoor scenes, Romantic landscapes became arenas for the sublime conflict between man and nature.

While Romanticism might have rejected certain principles of Neoclassicism, which did not drastically change the institutions of art and society. The state of almost perpetual revolution in France in the 19th century, provided an impetus to promulgate a more radical change. After the initial Revolution of 1789, France passed through the First Republic, the First Empire under Napoleon Bonaparte, the restoration of the Bourbon Monarchy, the Revolution of 1830, the July Monarchy, the Revolution of 1848, the Second Republic, the Second Empire, the Franco-Prussian War, and the establishment of the Paris Commune of 1871 and the establishment of the Third Republic.

Realism...

Challenging Neoclassicism and Romanticism as escapist in the face of the broader social issues brought by the turbulent 19th century, Realism began in France in the 1840s as the cultural aspect of a greater response to the constant change of governance, military occupation, and economic exploitation of colonies, industrialization, and urbanization in cities. This movement, more than the simple representation of nature, was an attempt to situate itself in the real: in scientific certainty, moral, and political.

In the 1830s, this impulse towards scientific positivism manifested itself with the advent of photography. In 1839, Louis Daguerre publicly demonstrated the daguerreotype, mechanically fixing an image of nature on a metal support using a camera. Simultaneously, in England, William Henry Fox Talbot did the same with the calotype, fixing the image on paper coated with iodide of silver. In turn, photography fueled Realism. Although Realist artists rarely worked with photographs, the greater conceptual force was their claim to veracity. If the right to govern was traditionally supported by art that idealized the powerful, photography suggested the possibility of literally showing the true flaws of the rulers. Amidst a revolutionary century, Realist painters sought to adapt the value of truth of photography to their art.