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Manet flees to Spain in 1865 after the poor reception of Olympia
Manet's goals and the goals of the proto-Impressionists were the same
Duret: "[Manet's] revolt was against the so-called high art of tradition, and against a pretended ideal, which he believed to be decrepit and without a future. For himself, he had sought a renewal of the springs of art in a close observation of contemporary life. In so doing he was continuing the French school of painting, and, following in the footsteps of the real masters to whom its development in the nineteenth century is due, he carried it another step forward."
Zola and Cézanne were school chums from Collège Bourbon in Aix-en-Provence, now known as Collège Mignet
Cézanne personally taught Zola about modern art by guiding him around the Salon des Refuses in 1863.
Zola was then introduced to Pissarro by Cézanne. Pissarro had been a student of Cezanne when he attended the Academie Suisse in 1861.
Pissarro was a student of Bazille and Monet, both of whom were sharing a studio which Cezanne and Pissarro would visit in 1865.
Pissarro and Bazille were guests at Zola's Thursday evening gatherings (1866) [1]
Antoine Guillemet introduces Zola to Manet in 1866 after Manet's return to France
Zola becomes Manet's defender and brings the artists and Manet together.
1869: Monet meets Manet and the others at the Café Guerbois They embrace Manet as their intellectual leader, but Manet never exhibits his own work with the Impressionists
Duret: "Now that Manet had forced his way into the Salon and for years had been prominently before the public, he came to be regarded as the man who more than any one else personified the revolt against the tradition and routine of the studios. Hence he began to attract the admiration of those artists who, like himself, felt the need of asserting their individuality and of seeking out new paths. Among these were four young men, who had cemented a friendship while working at Gleyre's studio,-Claude Monet, Renoir, Bazille, and Sisley. They underwent the same influences and constructed for themselves the same system of æsthetics. At the time when they were still feeling their way, Manet was producing a large amount of work; his method of painting in bright tones, therefore, exercised a decisive influence upon their development."
Paris Commune of 1871: impact on the group and influence on Impressionism. "Secret history" suppressed by art historians
Criticism
House (2004) dismisses the notion that the Batignolles group can be considered a "proto-Impressionist laboratory". Why?
Answer: not a "school", but a group of unique, individual artists pursuing the same professional goals (to escape the confines of the state-owned, academic stranglehold on their career), but using different techniques and subjects and approaches to achieve their goals. In other words, while the end result was "Impressionism", this was not a school that led to that product, but rather a group of disparate artists who each contributed something that led to that end, even if they were not themselves "Impressionists". To put it another way, the group may have birthed Impressionism, whereas a "school" would have given rise to a shared body of work at the same place and time. The oeuvre in and of itself was multifaceted, multi-regional, and diverse. It can be argued that this was not so much a new school but the casting off and displacement of the old, academic one.
