Due to French artists like Monet or Renoir, the usual association with impressionism is that of sunlit landscapes or Paris’ vie mondaine, painted in light and bright colours. But in Amsterdam, in the 1880’s, a group known as the Tachtigers (Eighty-ers) applied their own interpretation of the new movement and the works of artists such as George Hendrik Breitner, Isaac Israëls and Willem Witsen, looked quite different. The more sombre atmosphere and darker palette of the Tachtigers is partly explainable because of the less sunny climate in the Netherlands, but they also reveal a more pessimist attitude. What they had in common with their French colleagues, however, was a fascination for modern life and the wish to catch it in a spontaneous, non-academic style.
Isaac Israëls, son of the also famous Jozef Israëls, first worked in The Hague, but moved to the capital city in 1886. There Isaac started to paint impressions of Amsterdam street life, often lit by gaslight, a novelty just introduced in those days. Sometimes Israëls was so intrigued by a certain sight that he even rented a room on the opposite of the street to record it carefully.
This urban scene is painted from such an upper room, as well. In the corner we see a little girl, that seems to ‘walk into’ the painting, as if in a snapshot, reinforcing the impression of vivid reality. The gentleman and lady on the left contrast darkly against the brightly lit shop window. It is obvious that not the people are the protagonists in Isaac Israëls’ painting, but modern city life itself.
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