Formal Analysis - "Sunrise"

Towards the end of the 19th century in France, many artists gathered together to create a new style of painting, the Impressionism style. Impressionist artists mainly focused on making their art based on the members of the upper middle class and their lives as they relaxed in the countryside. After having many successful exhibitions, the Impressionist were able to organize their own alternatives of the Salon and the Academics no longer had control over the artistic standards in France. Claude Monet is one of my favorite Impressionist artists. He was also a leading exponent in Impressionism. His artworks were of modern style that celebrated the pleasure of going out and enjoying the life in the suburbs. Most of Monet's early work included some kind of expanse of water. One such painting is called the "Sunrise". At first, the entire painting seems to be of one color, but at our eye adjust to it after a while, we can distinguish the details which are very distinct and beautiful.

My first reaction to the painting was peace and calmness. It made me a little bit lazy and I just wanted to go lay down and enjoy the "Sunrise". After looking at it for a while, I realized that the scene is not as calm as it appeared to me at first. Yes, the water has almost no movement, except in the proximate area of the painting, that is why the painting seemed calm at first. In some areas it is so still that we can see the sun and the trees reflecting in the water as if it were a mirror. But at the same time, when my eye went from the sun to the clouds and the rest of the sky, I noticed a lot more movement. The strokes that painted the clouds tend to be going in a circular motion causing them to look like they are in action. It also looks like there might be a storm brewing up somewhere out in the sea as the sun rises.

When he had finished his painting, Claude Monet's rough strokes and shifting forms looked like an unfinished product, which did not appeal to many critics and caused them to level against his painting. To a friend, Monet had said that "when you paint, you need to try and forget what objects you are painting, but instead focus on the colors and shapes that are before you." (Stockstad p. 986) The colors that were used to make the "Sunrise" are complementary and work really good in this painting. Since it is a water scene, there is a lot of blue in the paining. The sunset adds orange and yellow to the scene that makes it look very beautiful.

In the "Sunrise" we can see that instead of painting a bay area full of boats and a sunrise, Monet painted blue, orange, yellow, green and pink colors onto a canvas which resulted in a beautiful scene that we see in the final product. A circle of orange is what turned out to be the sun. Streaks of white, yellow, blue and orange, turned out to be the sky and clouds with color reflecting onto them from the rising sun. The vertical and horizontal lines of a deeper blue turned out to be the silhouettes of the boats and ships that are either docked or are out in the bay area. As we look down at the lower part of the painting, we see some splashes of green and sage that at first, look like lily pads on a pond, but in the end they actually turn out to be relatively smaller boats with people in them. There is also a glistening blue color that makes up the water and the dashes of green represent the waves that are making their way to a tan colored dock, which also seems to be dissolving in the blue water scene. The water has other colors that reflect in it from the clouds and the sun, the most evident one is the reflection of the sun which stretches out vertically across a large portion of the painting.

The "Sunrise" gives you a sense of calmness after a storm had passed through, or even the kind of calm that is right before the storm hits. The whole composition, aside from the sun and the bold figures on the boats that are in the center of the painting, looks ghostly and washed out. It takes a while for your eyes to adjust to the painting and be able to make out what is actually going on in this painting. When you paint all of the mentioned above colors, shapes, and lines in the places that your eye sees them, you get a whole new impression on what is in front of you. Rather than looking at the scene as one whole, you will now see it as many colors, shapes and lines arranged in a particular order to make up a beautiful composition.