In The Work of Art, Anthea Callen analyzes the self-portraits, portraits of fellow artists, photographs, prints, and studio images of prominent nineteenth-century French Impressionist
painters, exploring the emergence of modern artistic identity and its relation to the idea of creative work. Landscape painting in general, she argues, and the plein air” oil sketch in
particular were the key drivers of change in artistic practice in the nineteenth centuryleading to the Impressionist revolution.
Putting the work of artists from Courbet and Cézanne to Pissaro under a microscope, Callen examines modes of self-representation and painting methods, paying particular attention to the
painters’ touch and mark-making. Using innovative methods of analysis, she provides new and intriguing ways of understanding material practice within its historical moment and the cultural
meanings it generates. Richly illustrated with 180 color and black-and-white images,The Work of Art offers fresh insights into the development of avant-garde French painting and the
concept of the modern artist.
