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TWENTY-FIVE

Paris-Journal : “We derived a certain amusement from the purple-colored landscapes, black streams, yellow or green women and blue children, but that is all we derived, with the exception of contempt.”

Le Charivari : “Their style of painting, which is both coarse and ill-defined, seems to us to be the confirmation of ignorance and the negation of beauty and truth.”

The well-respected critic M. Girard: “I’ve heard some call this new group The School of Impressionism, but the only impression they have made on me or the public is that of horror.”

édouard offers the bande the use of his studio as a meeting place where they can discuss the auction and its aftermath, pointedly noting that he must be elsewhere on the proposed day and time.

They take him up on this and gather on a Tuesday afternoon.

They voice distress at the personal slights flung at each of them, and Pissarro apologizes for his overreaction in Berthe’s defense.

She thanks him for his gallantry, and the men all insist if they had reached the lout in the top hat before he had, they would have done the same.

Then they settle down to discuss what they should do next.

“We must commit to continue our enterprise,” Degas exclaims before anyone else can speak. “We did sell some pictures, more than at the first exhibition. This is progress, and if we don’t expand upon it, it will be lost.”

“You aren’t trying to support a family,” Monet counters, clearly annoyed with Degas’s certitude, his assumption that he holds all the answers.

“I can’t sustain this outflow of funds when the return is less than I paid out, and I may have to begin working at our family store in Le Havre.

This is true of not only me. We don’t all have an outside income, Edgar.

” Animosity has long simmered between those with family money and those without.

“If we agree to remain a group, a cooperative working for the advantage of all of us,” Berthe interjects, “perhaps we can find ways to help one another when times are difficult.”

Pissarro nods. “I agree with Edgar, and I’d very much like to continue to show together, to have our work seen as a new movement.

Even if they continue to deride us as ‘the School of Impressionism.’” He shakes his head.

“But I fear I’m in the same position as Claude.

I don’t have the resources to take such a risk right now.

I must spend my time finding portrait commissions or resort to drawing caricatures on the street. ”

“I didn’t say that we shouldn’t help each other,” Degas grumbles. “I just said we should keep pressing our case. And what’s wrong with being ‘Impressionists’? Maybe we should adopt it as an official name. Take it from those myopic buffoons and claim it as our own.”

“Now that’s a suggestion I can agree to,” Renoir declares. “Shall we take a vote?”

Everyone raises a hand, and then they all burst into laughter, pleased with themselves and their new moniker. The tension in the room dissipates, and Berthe lifts her teacup. “To the Impressionists!”

Then the artists decide to move forward together, and concur that it makes sense to wait a year to hold their next auction or exhibition, in order for the critical hostility to settle and, hopefully, for the financial burdens of some of the members to ease.

They also agree that if the latter doesn’t come to pass, those with the means will provide the necessary funds to launch their new show.

It’s not a bande day, and as no one wants to take advantage of édouard’s generosity, they gather their things and bid each other goodbye.

Exhilarated by their consensus and eager to get back to work, Berthe remains in the studio, lingering over an unfinished picture she left there last week.

It’s a portrait of a young woman looking at herself in a mirror.

Her face is in profile, which is partially and waveringly reflected in the glass, as are the flowers on the table to her right.

It’s coming along, especially around the woman’s left shoulder and the touches of blue scattered within the dress to enhance the sensation of whiteness.

She’s trying to catch the model’s fleeting moment of introspection with a soft color palette.

Her challenge for the painting was to reveal the woman’s inner life, which had excited her when she started.

But now she sees it’s dull in tone and constrained in subject matter, paling in contrast to the vibrant, living canvases surrounding it. Canvases created by men.

Berthe is so engrossed she doesn’t hear édouard arrive, but she’s immediately attuned to his presence.

They haven’t been alone since the wedding, and she has no idea how he’ll treat her in their new circumstances.

Hopefully, as a gentleman and a brother-in-law.

She’s determined not to dishonor Gène or herself, and this is what she will do.

“I believe it will be one of your best.” édouard comes to stand next to her, ostensibly to more closely inspect the work.

“The nuanced use of light and color here.” He points to the shadows falling on the underside of the woman’s cheekbone.

“The way you’re beginning to capture the essence of the scene. The core of her.”

“It’s just a picture of an insipid woman looking at herself in a mirror,” Berthe says. “A simple portrait like so many others, saying nothing of import.”

He grasps her shoulders, turns her so that they are face-to-face.

“No painting is important just because of its subject. It gains its power from the manner in which the artist portrays that subject. And you have breathed life into what could have been a colorless and ordinary woman, revealing her soul, a glimpse into the human condition.”

She breaks away from his touch. “Thank you, édouard. I appreciate your encouragement,” she says stiffly.

“It’s not encouragement, woman. It’s the truth!”

Berthe reaches for her drawstring bag and suspends it from her wrist strap. “I was just leaving.”

“Can’t you stay a little longer? I want to hear how you’re doing, and how the postmortem went with your fellow renegades.”

The power of him freezes her in place, but she manages to say, “I have an engagement.”

“At three o’clock on a Tuesday afternoon?” he asks, his voice thick with skepticism. “How about you sit in that chair over there, and I’ll sit in this one over here?” His eyes twinkle. “Would that be acceptable to you?”

God help her, she sits.

“I’m sorry about the auction, Berthe. Deeply sorry. And, of course, furious at the stupidity and cruelty of it. Especially when it’s the opinions of a gaggle of small-minded morons who believe they know what art is, when all they know is what art used to be.”

“Well put.” She struggles to contain the smile tugging at her lips. Leave, she tells herself. Leave while you still can.

He leans forward in his chair, places his elbows on his knees. “It isn’t working, what you and the rest are trying to do. Can’t you see this isn’t the route to recognition or success? The two failures, no matter how unwarranted, are proof of this.”

“You said before that you’ve experienced the same negative reviews, even for the paintings exhibited by the Salon,” she tells him tersely. “And yet you continue to submit your work there. Why are our shows any different?”

“Also well put.” He flashes one of his intoxicating smiles.

“The Salon isn’t the only way to respectability.”

“I believe that it is.”

“Have you ever considered that you might be wrong? Now that Paris is recovering from the war, Durand-Ruel is doing well again. He’s opening a gallery here, maybe one in America. New York, he says. He believes in us, is our great champion, and he’s been selling more of our pictures.”

“One gallerist is not enough,” édouard insists. “I beg you not to pursue this course. Everything you’ve worked so hard for will come to nothing if you continue with this recklessness.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way, but we are going to move forward together. They’re my friends, and I respect and admire their work. We made a pact: the six of us, another show, no Salon.”

He kneels at her chair, takes her hands in his.

“They’re my friends too, and I feel the same way about their paintings.

” His eyes lock on to hers, a deeper blue than usual, full of heat.

“But you’re the love of my life, and I can’t bear for you to make such a grave mistake when you have so much to offer. ”

She’s touched by his concern and his faith in her work. But it’s his nearness, his breath falling on her breast, his intensity that are her undoing. The love of my life.

“You are an impossible man,” she says, but the lilt in her voice conveys that she doesn’t believe this is necessarily a bad trait.

“And you smell like flower petals.” He kisses her, and there’s nothing she can do but kiss him back. Nothing else she wants to do. They stand, and arms around each other, move to their red sofa, lie down, and press their bodies together.

BERTHE AND éDOUARD declare a truce. He acknowledges she’s not going to submit to the Salon, and she acknowledges his disapproval of her choice.

They will talk about it no more, and when she tells him the group is planning to call themselves Impressionists, he’s so delighted he jokes that maybe he’ll join them after all.