Sunset at Ivry – Armand Guillaumin, 1873

Sunset at Ivry – Armand Guillaumin, 1873

Armand Guillaumin’s Sunset at Ivry (1873), depicts a simple image of the sun setting behind a distant city. Closely associated with the Impressionist movement, Guillaumin chose to paint the sunset at a peculiar angle: the actual fading sun is eclipsed by ivry_sunsettwo tall and dark trees. It was very uncommon for impressionist painters to use black in their color scheme, yet they did intend on perfecting the different shades of light within a setting. The painting is mainly composed of short brushstrokes that fade into one another, especially visible in the upper part of the sky. His transition from blue to green to orange and to dark orange creates the illusion of a passage of time – another form of movement. Physical movement is effectively expressed in the smoke rising from the smokestacks in the distant city, flowing against the direction of the sun. Perhaps this was intended to present the conflict between nature and industrialism at the time.

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