Cityscapes: Camille Pissarro

Camille Pissarro's (French, 1830–1903) bustling cityscapes with their shimmering sense of light and space are among his greatest works. He would often paint the grand boulevards and handsome buildings of Paris from a high vantage point, reveling in the newly created sweeping views created in the remaking of Paris by Baron Georges-Eugene Haussmann. How charming these scenes seem to us now, but how modern they must have seemed when first painted!

Pissarro was a political anarchist, not interested in violent revolution but instead desiring a truly egalitarian society. His political views on the equality of all peoples made their way into his respectful paintings of peasantry, and perhaps in these urban paintings as well, where there is an equal focus on all the citizenry on these busy Paris streets.

Boulevard Montmartre, Spring oil on canvas 25.59"x31.89" 1897

Boulevard des Italiens, Morning, Sunlight  oil on canvas 28 13/16"x 36 1/4" 1897

Rue de l'Épicerie, Rouen (Effect of Sunlight) oil on canvas 1898

Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where other people see nothing.- Camille Pissarro