马戏团杂耍

1880s

Charles Henry's lectures at the Sorbonne

In the 1880s Seurat hears lectures by the mathematician Charles Henry at the Sorbonne on the emotional properties and symbolic meaning of lines and colour; there remains controversy over how far he adopted Henry's ideas.

1886

Nine works, the public's mockery and the critics' defence

At the last Impressionist exhibition Seurat presents nine works; the critics R. Marx and Félix Fénéon write favourable reviews, but the public ridicules the “pictures painted in dots”, and the Swiss critic Émile Hennequin finds them grey and poor in light. The Impressionists are sceptical: when Pissarro says that “La Grande Jatte” is very interesting, Degas replies that he would have noticed, but it is so large; Seurat himself blames the hall for being too dark and cramped to give the picture the necessary distance.

15 May – 15 June 1886

“La Grande Jatte” is first shown at the eighth Impressionist exhibition

“A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte” is shown to the public for the first time at the eighth Impressionist exhibition, held from 15 May to 15 June 1886. The painting will initiate Neo-Impressionism and alter the direction of modern art.

19 September 1886

Fénéon names “Neo-Impressionism” and defends Seurat

Félix Fénéon, who gives the new movement the name “Neo-Impressionism”, defends the artist in an article for the Belgian paper “L'Art Moderne” of 19 September 1886: here, he argues, no virtuosity of brushwork or impasto is needed, but the eye must be quick, sharp and perceptive.