Painting "Absinthe" - road to nowhere

Absinthe - strong alcoholic beverage (over 72degrees), which was prepared on the basis of wormwood with the addition of mint and anise. This cheap alcohol appeared in the eighteenth century and was first popular among ordinary workers because of its cheapness. Then it became widely used in bohemian circles. But absinthe is a hallucinogen, it caused aggression and addiction, like addiction, and severe convulsions. His use was banned in 1915. Under the brand "Pernod" it is produced until the present days.

Painting "Absinthe"

In France, it is assumed that for the first time the work wasexhibited at the second exhibition of the Impressionists, entitled "Absinthe". In 1876, part of the impressionists refused to attend the favorite café of Courbet "Gerbois", where it was too noisy. They began to meet on Pigal's dance at the cafe "New Athens". Edgar Degas, the author of the painting Absinthe, portrayed his friends - actress Ellen Andre (who in life was a well-groomed woman, served as a model and Renoir, and Gervais, danced in the Folies-Bergeres) and painter Marcelin Debuten. Debuten squandered his considerable fortune, fame as an artist did not receive and gradually descended. The work illustrates the mores of Parisian life, raises the problem of alcoholism, which was described by other artists, including the writer E. Zola. Show the life of "beautiful" the artist did not aspire. He allowed the viewer to peer into the realities that surrounded him.

The tool was the painting "Absinthe".

Image analysis

In bohemian Paris, two suffer from loneliness,even being near. Their faces are gloomy. They have the appearance of people who are detached from reality. Both are dressed sloppy, especially a man. He does not look at his companion, his face is puffy from the fact that he regularly drinks. Around a man a tall glass with a mazargan. This drink was used to remove the hangover. The woman has an extinct absent look, her shoulders are lowered, her face pale because of abusing absinthe. Legs are ugly stretched forward. She does not follow them, and they are placed in a vskorjachku. Before her, apparently, is not the first glass with a cloudy-greenish absinthe. His model draws water from a bottle, standing on a nearby table. Their privacy is emphasized by compositional construction. Degas placed the pair on an inclined plane. This is a tribute to fashion. In Europe, then everyone was addicted to Japanese engraving with its unusual perspective and surprisingly accurate drawing. In addition, the pair occupies only the right corner of the picture, the remaining two-thirds are half-empty tables. They have newspapers, matches, an empty bottle. Even with complete solitude, the two still retain the inner closeness of these people. They share one thing - the loss of hope. The painting "Absinthe" is simply filled with hopelessness, which in no small measure intensifies the faded color.

At the exhibition in London

In 1872-1873 the picture was exhibited forThe Channel also aroused indignation of the well-intentioned Victorian public. Degas analyzed the scene without any complacency, a clear and critical look. Most of all, when considering his work, one remembers the naturalism of E. Zola, and possibly Toulouse-Lautrec. The painting "Absinthe" is in the museum of Orsay in Paris.

Work of Picasso

The theme of loneliness, isolation and emptiness in the cafe is notnew. In the second half of the XIX century it can be found in the works of Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec. But in the paintings of the young Spanish artist yet there was no sense of drama. Picasso has not yet moved to Paris. He happens here by arrivals from Barcelona. At the age of 22 he was attracted to the popular story, connected with the general obsession with absinthe. He was given special properties, allowing to awaken the imagination, push to a new perception of the world and creativity. Painting "Lovers of absinthe" Pablo Picasso has a very strong emotional impact.

First, the plot completely reveals the psychologywomen. The face is written with a weak semblance of a smile, sarcasm, doom and fatigue. It is immediately evident that the woman is somewhere far away with her thoughts. Here it is absent. Nobody needs it, only absinthe is her friend and comforter. Secondly, the color. It is built on the gloomy contrast of dull red and blue and comparable to the gloomy life collisions, of which there is no way out. The bluish marble table continues this void theme that surrounds the woman in her desperate loneliness. The frozen body of a woman only strengthens this impression. She cringed. The right hand is intentionally changed in proportions, completely completing the oval and turning off the woman from this world. The painting was painted in the autumn of 1901 in Paris and is in the Hermitage.

van Gogh

In 1887, Van Gogh's painting "Still Life with Absinth" appears. He is laconic.

On the table is a bottle of water and a glass with absinthe. Through the window you can see the departing person. Perhaps he was sitting at this table. But more interesting is another. The problem of alcoholism, which faced the artist himself. He himself willingly used this drink, which also causes visual disturbances. This leads to the fact that the whole world appears in yellow tones. Perhaps, therefore, there was a period when the painter in the paintings was dominated by a yellow color, especially during his life in the south of France. The fascination with absinthe also led to a confusion of consciousness in 1888, when he cut off his ear. The painting is in the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

And the conclusion is the simplest.

Alcoholism comes very simply, and the result is terrible.