Katherine Rothkopf

I saw an exhibition of Pissarro paintings in San Francisco last year and wanted to learn more about the man and his paintings. I had very limited knowledge of him beforehand, but knew that his paintings had appealed to me on some indefineable level. I found this book to be an excellent presentation of Pissarro's early work and his development as a landscape painter in the years before the Impressionist movement took hold. There are several really good essays included in this book along with a catalogue of paintings held in several cities from 2006 to 2008 with excellent descriptions and discussions. I wish I had seen the exhibition but this book really educated me on the paintings. I liked this a lot. The book helped me understand the artist. The author in trying to define Pissarro's landscape work selects the beginnings of a William Blake poem, which I found quite apt:

To see a World in a Grain of sand
And Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour

Pissarro's landscapes really capture a rural France becoming more modern, and preserve it for us, perhaps for infinity, but certainly for now.… (más)