Intimate Impressionism at the Legion of Honor

It was a magical afternoon in San Francisco: warm, comfortable, and not a shred of fog in sight. For my lunch break, I decided to visit the Legion of Honor in order to see the Initimate Impressionism exhibit.

When I arrived, I read that the paintings were on loan from the National Gallery. My heart sank. I had visited the National Gallery before and the impressionist paintings there struck me as fairly dull. Luckily, this exhibit had a few notable pieces and my eye danced in the light captured by the artists. However, many of the pieces seemed to be in the exhibit merely as a historical example rather than as an exceptional piece of art.

The paintings in the exhibit cost millions of dollars and, at the same time, the paintings didn’t seem all that exceptional. Maybe it’s because impressionism has been imitated so often that it feels commonplace. I half expect that I could wander into an antique shop and buy a landscape painting similar in quality and style to some of those in the exhibit for about $300. And honestly, though the pieces by Cezanne and Renoir stood out, I couldn’t tell why some of the pieces by lesser known artists were in the exhibit. Maybe I’ve got it all wrong. Maybe they’re trully noteworthy. Living life 150 years after the advent of impressionism, it’s easy to forget just how radical the movement was.

When visiting an exhibit like this one, I generally ignore the curators comments and skip the audio tour–especially when I’m in a hurry. But in this case, I found that the comments were well written. The explantory text stayed focused and to the point. The paintings were organized to show the historical development of human perception and how impressionism evolved. And I learned some things about the connection between pointillism and the small brush strokes of impressionism.

Though I enjoyed the exhibit, the trully magnificient part of the trip was the location. After rushing through the exhibit, I stepped outside in the afternoon light and had my breath taken away by the view. The sun radiated clean and bright. Clouds, perfectly formed, cast shadows on the lush green hillsides of the Marin Headlands. The ocean was a riveting silvery blue. The view was a sight trully worth painting.