Manet associated with a number of young artists who became known as Impressionists after a group exhibition in 1874. One of them, Claude Monet (page 29), displayed a picture called _Impression, Sunrise_, and a newspaper critic, vastly amused at its sketchy style and at the similar sketchiness of the other pictures in the exhibit, jeered that these artists were not painters at all, but “impressionists.” The name stuck to the group because it so aptly characterized their intentions. Their aim was to catch a fresh impression of nature in their pictures. Monet was the leading figure in Impressionism, which developed in the 1870’s and ’80’s. Son of a grocer in Le Havre, he was doing clever caricatures at the age of fifteen. He began to paint landscapes with a fellow artist, Boudin, who taught him to be aware of special effects of outdoor lighting. Going to Paris in 1863, he attended academic classes but usually stayed only long enough to answer roll call. Then he would be off to the city’s outskirts to paint nature instead of ancient heroes. Often he lured others with him, and Impressionism was born in the friendly competition of Monet, Renoir, Bazille, and Sisley. Soon they were joined by others, among them Camille Pissarro and Berthe Morisot. For many years they sought understanding for their works. Monet, who alone pursued Impressionism to its ultimate possibilities by painting vivid sensations of light, suffered abject poverty. Only in his last years was his art recognized and internationally imitated. Few of the other Impressionists analyzed light as Monet did; they contented themselves with sketchy brush strokes which seemed to dissolve their forms in light. Berthe Morisot (page 31), for example, followed Manet rather than Monet. After six years of study with Corot, she met Manet while they were both copying pictures in the Louvre. A strong friendship developed between Manet and the Morisot family. Berthe became his pupil and soon afterward married his brother. Her crisp, delicate brushwork is a feminine version of Manet’s bold style. Auguste Renoir (cover illustration and page 42), whose glowing colors rivaled Monet’s, was among the first to outgrow Impressionism. This son of a Limoges tailor was earning his living at thirteen in Paris by painting flowers on china. He saved enough money to attend an academy and met Monet, with whom he often painted along the banks of the Seine. But by about 1883 he found he “had wrung Impressionism dry.” He regretted the loss of form, composition, and human values in the shimmering Impressionist pictures. Setting himself again to paint forms solidly in space, he nevertheless retained the brilliant colors of Impressionism.