Paris Street, Rainy Day

Camille O'Leary
Gustave Caillebotte, Paris Street; Rainy Day, 1877

Caillebotte was an outsider among the Impressionists; a lawyer from a wealthy family who espoused the ideals of the Impressionist movement, but whose flat, exacting style of painting had more to do with Realism. Living off a large inheritance from his parents, he pursued painting and gardening as hobbies while buying artwork from his colleagues, amassing a sizable collection of Impressionist work. His own paintings were influenced by the growing art of photography, using tricks like cropping, tilted floors, and high vantage points to create unusual and precise perspectives.

Paris Street, Rainy Day prominently showcases the new boulevards and changes to the cityscape taking place during this period. The “Haussmanization” of Paris meant great leaps forward in urban planning, bringing new public parks, monuments, facilities, and more. The sharp, geometric buildings of this intersection near the Gare St-Lazare tower over the disproportionately small people in the streets. As the scene extends back into the distance, it blurs, mimicking the limited depth of field of a photograph. The flatness of the shading evokes, more than anything, more modern artists like Edward Hopper, not Impressionism. The unusually detached crowd move like sleepwalkers, none of them making eye contact. In fact, the three people in the right foreground are about to unwittingly collide. The overall effect comes off as carefully planned, but still amazingly spontaneous; the viewer feels as though they have stepped outside on a rainy day in Paris to marvel at the grand façades of their modern city.
  • 7:00 AM

Paris Street, Rainy Day

Gustave Caillebotte
Gustave Caillebotte, Paris Street, Rainy Day, 1877
Gustave Caillebotte's interest in art began with photography, and from there he started to paint. This inclination of his towards photography influenced his painting, as depth of field and other qualities from photography were apparent in his works. In this painting, the two people in the foreground are slightly blurred while the people in the background seems to be in better focus. The buildings in the background become the vanishing point and become a mystery to the viewer. The figures in the painting are complacent, and the painting depicts a casual day in Paris in the time period.

 The intersection near the railroad Gare Saint-Lazare is shown in the painting and the figures are walking on the rue de Turin. The colors, which are grays, are beautiful, and the people's casual strolls make it feel like a true moment. I'm thankful for this painting because it was one of the first paintings I ever noticed when I was younger. I thought it was beautiful. My dad had just introduced the board game Masterpiece to me and my sister, and it was then that this painting caught my eye. I would try to get it every time we played even if it was not to my advantage. The painting inspired me.

  • 7:00 AM

Umbrellas - Paris Street, Rainy Day

Caillebotte
Umbrellas
Curated by Max Cantu-Lima
Gustave Caillebott, Paris Street; Rainy Day, 1877
Painted in 1877, Gustave Caillebotte’s painting Paris Street, Rainy Day, depicts a new Paris, renovated by Baron Haussmann under Napoleon. The cobble road, the street lamps, and the building all fresh and clean with crisp lines, represents the feel of Paris. The city did not have the same feel as the old for the citizens. Improved sewage and avenues fixed the waste management problems as well as the complex road system the city once had. The city lacked the imperfections the buildings once owned, their uniqueness. Paris, like a new pair a shoes, alien at touch, had to be broken into, put to use, worn before it could earn the sense of home that it once provided.

This new city provided modern stores and residences. By cleaning up the waste, Paris became more attractive. Accompanied with this new modernism, were the citizens, as upper class was growing, as represented by the attire worn by the couple and the surrounding townsman. The top hats, suits, and umbrellas were demonstrations of their social standing. The dark, clean, and flat surfaces of the umbrellas connect the city and its population, both fresh and foundations for the years to come.

  • 8:00 AM

Paris Street; Rainy Day

Austin Krause
Gustave Caillebotte, Paris street; Rainy Day,1877

      Paris, being one of the biggest tourist destinations in the world, is best known for its luxurious lifestyle along with its landmarks: The Eiffel Tower, Louvre, Arc de Triomphe, and many others. The stories of the catabombs and underground tunnels below echo through out the city. Tunnels run below the city of Paris that lead the giant lime stone quarries. These quarries are the key source to most of the stone used to make these monuments buildings that we know today. The mining of these quarries resulted in over one hundred and fifty miles of tunnels and caverns that weave through out the underside of this monumental city.

     The maze that is the underside of Paris provides a strong history lesson. An explorer, within the endless miles of tunnels, can find Nazi Bunkers, French resistance rooms, and graffiti on the wall from the French Revolution that is sketched in with carbon black. It is not recommended for claustrophobic people to explore the catabombs due to their tight spaces and at some points, the explorer has to army crawl on his stomach. These tunnels are not all about fun and games. Exploring them is risky because they are often flooded and they have the possibility of collapsing. In 1774, the street “Rue d'Enfer” collapsed because of the strain on the tunnel walls. It is interesting to learn about the darker side of the "City of Light". These tunnels provide more than a story, they provide a historical background about revolution, progress and art.
  • 12:00 AM