Post-Impressionism

Post-Impressionism wasn't a unified movement but a generation of artists who pushed beyond Impressionism's emphasis on light and color. From roughly 1886 to 1910, painters like Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, and Georges Seurat each developed distinct personal styles that would shape Modern art.

Cézanne flattened space and built forms from geometric color patches, becoming the "father of modern art." Van Gogh painted emotional intensity with swirling brushwork and bold colors. Gauguin sought escape in Tahiti, using flat colors and symbolic imagery. Seurat developed Pointillism, applying tiny dots of pure color in scientific precision.

These artists worked largely in isolation, often misunderstood in their lifetimes. Van Gogh sold almost nothing before his death at 37. Today, their works command the highest auction prices in art history. Major collections exist at the Musée d'Orsay, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, and the Art Institute of Chicago.