Camille Pissarro

Camille Pissarro (1830 – 1903) made significant contributions to both Impressionism and Post-Impressionism.

Pissarro friendships included many Impressionist artists, including Cézanne, Monet, Manet, Renoir, and Degas.

He is the only artist to have shown his work at all eight Paris Impressionist exhibitions, from 1874 to 1886.

He acted as a father figure not only to the Impressionists but also to the significant Post-Impressionists, including Georges Seurat, Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin.

Virtual Tour of Camille Pissarro

Boulevard Montmartre Series by Camille Pissarro
- Boulevard Montmartre: Afternoon, Sunshine
- The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter Morning
- Boulevard Montmartre at Night
Pont Boieldieu in Rouen
- The Pont Boieldieu at Sunset
- Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, Rainy Weather
- Morning, An Overcast Day, Rouen
- The Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, sunset, foggy weather

Virtual Tour of Camille Pissarro

Boulevard Montmartre Series by Camille Pissarro

Boulevard Montmartre: Afternoon, Sunshine

“Boulevard Montmartre: Afternoon, Sunshine” by Camille Pissarro was to be part of a thirteen artwork series of the famous Boulevard.

Pissarro painted it in 1897 after renting a room at the Grand Hotel de Russie in Paris. Pissarro felt he had a perfect view to capture the true essence of the busy Parisian street.

From his elevated station, he obtains a bird’s-eye view of the people, carriages, and life that passed before him.

Each painting in the “Boulevard Montmartre Series” depicts the same scene and view in different climatic conditions and at different times of the day.

This painting depicts Paris’s life during the working hours of the day full of activity and purpose. This image portrays a dynamic urban landscape, captured by Pissarro’s rapid brushwork. Museum: Hermitage Museum

The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter Morning

“The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter Morning” by Camille Pissarro was painted after his six years in rural Éragny.

Pissarro marveled that he could “see down the whole length of the boulevards” with “almost a bird’s-eye view of carriages, omnibuses, people, between big trees, big houses that have to be set straight.”

In his urban city landscapes, he emphasized order, proportion, and structure, while depicting dynamic movement.

Not through attention to fine details, but with less individually drawn figures, he focused on broad subjects in his portrayal of real life.

His brushstrokes consist of short, loose, semi-thick strokes to enhance the idea of motion running through his work. Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art – MET

Boulevard Montmartre at Night

“Boulevard Montmartre at Night” by Camille Pissarro shows the busy Parisian boulevard at night, wet after a downpour.

This work gave Pissarro the opportunity to study the effect of the new electric street lamps, aligned in the middle of the street, and the orange glow of the gas lights in the windows.

Pissarro tried to represent the different effects of the artificial lights in different colors, both pale and bluish and warm and intense. Museum: The National Gallery, London

Pont Boieldieu in Rouen

The “Pont Boieldieu in Rouen” by Camille Pissarro is a series of paintings of the Pont Boïeldieu and the quays surround by industrial traffic. Our tour includes:

The Pont Boieldieu at Sunset

“The Pont Boieldieu at Sunset” by Camille Pissarro depicts the Pont Boieldieu, an iron bridge completed in 1885. This painting shows Pissarro’s interest in moving beyond just traditional landscape paintings of verdant rural scenes.

It is one of a series of paintings created at a time when Pissarro was seeking to paint the industrial modernity of the area.

Pissarro had made an earlier trip in 1883 to Rouen and had created a series of images of the city.

However, on his 1896 visits, he stayed at different hotels, each with a balcony from which he could paint the bridge from a different angle. Museum: Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, UK

Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, Rainy Weather

“Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, Rainy Weather” by Camille Pissarro depicts the iron bridge and across the river are the Gare d’Orléans train station and the Place Carnot square. His Rouen series focuses on the bustle of the modern city.

The Rouen pictures are a return to Impressionism after a decade of experimenting with Post-Impressionism and Pointillism.

Pissarro deliberately sought out a view of the busy industrial section of the town and produced several paintings of the view from the hotel in different light conditions and different weather.

He was attracted to Rouen, describing it as having a unique character with its juxtaposition of old and new, which is part of what makes Pissarro’s urban paintings so interesting. Museum: Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto

Morning, An Overcast Day, Rouen

“Morning, An Overcast Day, Rouen” by Camille Pissarro depicts the Boieldieu Bridge, or Grand Pont, that Pissarro painted from a room in the Hôtel d’Angleterre.

Pissarro visited Rouen in 1896 and in a letter written that year, he describes the paintings:

“The theme is the bridge near the Place de la Bourse with the effects of rain, crowds of people coming and going, smoke from the boats, quays with cranes, workers in the foreground, and all this in grey colors glistening in the rain.”

He also added: “what particularly interests me is the motif of the iron bridge in wet weather with all the vehicles, pedestrians, workers on the embankment, boats, smoke, haze in the distance; it’s so spirited, so alive.” Museum: Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, sunset, foggy weather

“The Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, sunset, foggy weather” by Camille Pissarro depicts the bridge in foggy weather, with its traffic of horse-drawn carts and pedestrians. In the distance, the quays are busy with boats layered with smoke and mist.

The bridge joined the old Gothic city in the north with the southern industrial areas of Sainte-Sever. On the far bank, the boats are docking and unloading cargo, with the urban landscape in the background.

Pissarro’s pointillist experiences in the years 1885-1890 and the technique of juxtaposed tones allowed him to exploit all the resources of his palette.

Pissarro captures the transitive effects of the mist and smoke, with a sense of movement in the city’s activity. Museum: Musée des Beaux-Arts de Rouen

Name: Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro
Born: 1830 – Saint Thomas, Danish West Indies (now US Virgin Islands)
Died: 1903 (aged 73) – Paris, France
Nationality: Danish-French
Movement: Impressionism, Post-Impressionism
Notable works:
- Boulevard Montmartre Series by Camille Pissarro
  - Boulevard Montmartre: Afternoon, Sunshine
  - The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter Morning
  - Boulevard Montmartre at Night
- Pont Boieldieu in Rouen
  - The Pont Boieldieu at Sunset
  - Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, Rainy Weather
  - Morning, An Overcast Day, Rouen
  - The Pont Boieldieu in Rouen, sunset, foggy weather

Camille Pissarro: A collection of paintings

A Tour of French Artists

Georges de La Tour (1593 – 1652)
Nicolas Poussin (1594 – 1665)
Élisabeth Sophie Chéron (1648 – 1711)
François Boucher (1703 – 1770)
Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732 – 1806)
Jacques-Louis David (1748 – 1825)
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780 – 1867)
Eugène Delacroix (1798 – 1863)
Rosa Bonheur (1822 – 1899)
Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824 – 1904)
Camille Pissarro (1830 – 1903 )
Édouard Manet (1832 – 1883)
Edgar Degas (1834 – 1917)
Paul Cézanne (1839 – 1906)
Auguste Rodin (1840 – 1917)
Claude Monet (1840 – 1926)
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841 – 1919)
Berthe Morisot (1841 – 1895)
Henri Rousseau (1844 – 1910)
Gustave Caillebotte (1848 – 1894)
Jean Béraud (1849 – 1935)
Georges Seurat (1859 – 1891)
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864 – 1901)
Artists and their Art
Famous French Painters You Should Know

Camille Pissarro classic paintings

Camille Pissarro Quotes

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“Don’t be afraid in nature: one must be bold, at the risk of having been deceived and making mistakes.”

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“It is absurd to look for perfection.”

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“God takes care of imbeciles, little children, and artists.”

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“I sometimes have a horrible fear of turning up a canvas of mine. I’m always afraid of finding a monster in place of the precious jewels I thought I had put there!”

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“At times, I come across works of mine which are soundly done and really in my style, and at such moments I find great solace.”

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“Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where other people see nothing.”

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“When you do a thing with your whole soul and everything that is noble within you, you always find your counterpart.”

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“Everything is beautiful; all that matters is to be able to interpret.”

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“Cover the canvas at the first go, then work at it until you see nothing more to add.”

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“Observe that it is a great error to believe that all mediums of art are not closely tied to their time.”

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“Paint the essential character of things.”

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“I remember that, although I was full of fervor, I didn’t have the slightest inkling, even at forty, of the deeper side to the movement we were pursuing by instinct. It was in the air!”

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“I began to understand my sensations, to know what I wanted, at around the age of forty – but only vaguely.”

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“At fifty, that is in 1880, I formulated the idea of unity, without being able to render it. At sixty, I am beginning to see the possibility of rendering it.”

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“I regard it as a waste of time to think only of selling: one forgets one’s art and exaggerates one’s value.”

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“All the sorrow, all the bitterness, all the sadness, I forget them and ignore them in the joy of working.”

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“One can do such lovely things with so little. Subjects that are too beautiful end by appearing theatrical.”

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“Cover the canvas at the first go, then work at it until you see nothing more to add.”

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“It is only by drawing often, drawing everything, drawing incessantly, that one fine day you discover to your surprise that you have rendered something in its true character.”

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“Work at the same time on the sky, water, branches, ground, keeping everything going on an equal basis… Don’t be afraid of putting on color… Paint generously and unhesitatingly, for it is best “not to lose the first impression.”

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