Date of Award

5-2017

Document Type

Thesis open access

Department

Art

First Advisor

Michael Schreyach

Second Advisor

Kathryn O’Rourke

Abstract

This project investigates Gustave Caillebotte's techniques of constructing and arranging space. Previous scholarship has examined the artist's works in light of external, social, and historic evidence, therefore, my account will provide a detailed formal analysis of the works considering the role of the intended viewer. In looking closely Young Man Playing the Piano, Man at his Bath, and Pont de l’Europe, I argue that the viewpoint assigned to the beholder projects an irreconcilable vision of modernity. Caillebotte utilizes elements of representational painting--viewpoints, the illusion of time, the arrangement of people within space, and the built structures that describe space--in order to involve the viewer in an interaction that corresponds to the represented space.

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