Circa 1866: European Prints from the Collection

The 1860s was a pivotal time for artistic innovation in Paris and London. Artists increasingly featured both the directly observed local landscape and scenes from contemporary life in their works, laying the foundation for impressionism, the painting style that has come to represent the beginning of modern art. Painters also rediscovered the venerable printmaking medium of etching, which had been practiced by Rembrandt and other earlier masters, but fell out of favor following the invention of lithography in 1798. In addition, etching was a versatile means for making original works that appealed to a growing art collectors market. While artists like James McNeill Whistler produced etchings as an extension of their painting practice, others devoted most of their careers to printmaking. 

This exhibition features prints by artists working in France and England during the 1860s and early 1870s. They represent a new generation of artists who embraced the expressive qualities of etching and realized works with rich contrasts of light and dark that utilize a range of freely drawn and precise lines. Figural painters such as Jean-François Millet and Édouard Manet explored different combinations of marks to create their depictions of urban and rural types,while landscape specialists including Maxime Lalanne and Auguste Delâtre demonstrate the range of atmospheric effects possible through etching.  

Several of these works have been part of the Zimmerli’s collection since the museum was founded in 1966 as the Rutgers University Art Gallery. On this occasion of the Zimmerli’s golden anniversary, the prints on view celebrate the museum’s graphic arts collection and its strength in nineteenth-century French art.

Organized by Christine Giviskos, Curator of Prints, Drawings, and European Art