When a simple and beautiful Sunday afternoon unveils a new chapter in the history of art

Over the course of art history, certain pieces have come to symbolize entire artistic genres. Leonardo’s Mona Lisa and Michelangelo’s David, for example, define the Italian Renaissance; The Scream by Edvard Munch epitomizes Expressionism; and Pointillism typified by Georges Seurat’s A Sunday Afternoon the Island of La Grande Jatte has forever initiated a new art movement in the history.

Georges Seurat began painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte in the spring of 1884. During this time, the artist lived and worked alongside the Impressionists in Paris. Like these artists, Seurat often painted scenery found just outside of the French capital, including La Grande Jatte, a Seine River island situated in the west of Paris.
Seurat began painting this masterpiece by sketching and taking a cue from the Impressionists. He created these studies away from his studio. This approach enabled him to capture the color, light, and movement of the scene before him, which he revisited several times before finishing the final large-scale painting in 1886.

Seurat later added small dots that appear as solid and luminous forms when seen from a long enough distance. This was the way he spectacularly proved his theory, showing that employing tiny juxtaposed dots of multi-colored paint really can allow the viewer’s eye to blend colors optically. This turned out to be a revolutionary alternative to the way traditional painters went about defining forms within their artworks’ compositions. This new art is later called “Pointillism” or a combination of dots pioneered by George Seurat.

Discover A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte in the multimedia exhibition, The Impressionists at MoDa Gallery on the 2nd floor until 18 April. 

*Since your safety is our prior concern, River City Bangkok is open as usual with strict preventive measures against the Covid-19 and limitation of visitors inside all exhibitions.