Seurat and the Bathers,

In Seurat and The Bathers the authors discuss the various choices Seurat made with regard to subject, format and technique in preparing this monumental painting. They relate Seurat's working methods - the preparatory oil sketches and drawings - and the painting's physical nature - colour, brushwork and surface - to his academic training, his study of optical theory, the development of his distinctive drawing style, and his early interest in plein-air oil sketching and impressionism. Stylistically, Seurat responded to the French tradition of monumental figure painting and also to contemporary artists, both Salon painters and Impressionists, arriving at a paradoxical but subtle new synthesis. Finally the authors consider the subject matter of the Bathers in relation to other nineteenth-century representations of middle- and working-class life and leisure activities in the Parisian suburbs, particularly at Asnieres.

Smith (art history, Univ. of Bristol) argues here that Seurat's works can be seen both ideologically and aesthetically and that the "meaning" will therefore depend on the point of view. He thoroughly reviews Seurat's enterprise, drawing heavily on contemporary theory and criticism. He presents informed discussions on color theory, line, subject-matter, art movements, and politics, and he elucidates the visionary aesthetics based on Richard Wagner in the making of Seurat's paintings and the role of ideas therein. The ideas are complex and, as with much contextual art history, demand much prior knowledge on the part of the reader; but the book is well organized and the writing is clear. For advanced and specialized collections. Curator Leighton and scholar Thomson offer the catalog of a single-painting exhibition at London's National Gallery. Again, it is very clearly written, with background on Seurat's work leading up to his 1884 masterpiece, "Bather at Asnieres"; detailed exposition on the technical aspects of the painting; and an accessible discussion of the artistic context for the work?including informative illustrations and comparisons with contemporary bather subject pictures. Narrower in focus than Smith's book, but aimed at a broader audience, Seurat and the Bathers succeeds on both the popular and the scholarly level and is recommended for all collections.?Jack Perry Brown, Art Inst. of Chicago Lib.
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