Liu, 1

Yang Liu

Professor Barr

Arh 202

April 27, 2017

An Analysis of Georges Seurats a Sunday on La Grande Jatte

Georges Seurat painted a Sunday on La Grande Jatte between the years of 1884-1886

using oil on canvas. The size of the canvas is approximately 7x10 feet and it is the largest

artwork of Seurat. This painting depicts the life of wealthy middle-class people on a typical

Sunday on an island in the Seine River called La Grande Jatte, which is translated into Big Bowl

Island (A Sunday Afternoon). The painting is a representation art piece for Neo-Impressionism

and it is a permanent exhibition of the Chicago Institute of Art.

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Born in 1859 in Paris, Seurats parents had enough money to support him for his livings

for life (Seurat and the Making of La Grande Jatte). His artistic career began in the prestigious

cole des Beaux-Arts, which is the School of Fine Arts located in Paris. He studied under a

conservative academic painter Henri Lehmann. However, he quickly quit school after a year and

a half and joined the military for his mandatory service. Although he returned to art after he

finished his military service, he worked on his own instead of going back to school. After the

exhibition of Bathing Place, Asnires (188384), Seurat invested much time in planning and

sketching drafts for the figures in a Sunday on La Grand Jatte and finished this painting two

years later (Platzer, Sunday in the Park). He also spent time in studying the fashion trends

which made the clothing in the painting seem so fashionable. Seurat died because of diphtheria

in 1891 when he was only 31.

In this huge painting, there are forty-eight people, eight boats, three dogs, and one

monkey. Even though there are forty-eight people in total in the painting, there is only one

person in the painting who is interacting with the audience. The little girl in a white dress who

stands in the center of the whole painting is looking is directly to the eyes of the audience. Her

white dress shows that she is the representation of innocence. She is also the only one figure who

is not colored dots painted. This may imply that Seurat thinks that she is the only one who does

not needs to be decorated by colored dots because she is so innocent. In addition, this little girl is

also not covered by shade while all the other figures are either covered by umbrellas or shades.

This again emphasize that she is the only innocent person in the whole painting.

Although at first glance, one may think that the figures in the painting are relaxing on a

Sunday and performing leisure activities, apart from the little girl in white dress, many other
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figures in the painting are acting suspiciously. The lady who is wearing an orange-colored dress

on the left side of the painting is fishing next to the river. But is she really fishing for fish? In the

nineteenth century, La Grande Jatte is thought to be a place for the wealthy people to call for

prostitutes (The Private Life of a Masterpiece). Since the prostitution business is illegal, this

woman is pretending that she is fishing while in fact she might be hunting for male customers.

The woman who is wearing a black top and holding a black umbrella on the right side of the

painting seems to be the one who is in the innermost corner of shades. The decoration on her hat

and her dress shows that she is leading fashion. She is holding a dog and a monkey on leash in

her hand. The puppy is thought be very expensive to afford at that time, therefore, this shows that

the man next to her must be very rich to buy everything for her. The monkey seems odd in the

painting as one may think that why would a monkey appear in the park. After the painting has

been scanned by X-ray, it was found out that the monkey was not there on the bottom layer

(The Private Life of a Masterpiece). This shows that Seurat did not plan to paint the monkey

when he first started the painting, but he later added the monkey. Many think that he had special

intent by adding the monkey as female monkey in French means prostitution in the 1880s (The

Private Life of a Masterpiece). This in turn again refers the woman on the foremost right as a

prostitute who offers her body in return of money from the man. These interpretations of the

painting as a whole shows how Seurat understands the middle class French society at that time.

However, according to Art Institute of Chicago, Seurat explained to the French poet

Gustave Kahn, The Panathenaeans of Phidias formed a procession. I want to make modern

people, in their essential traits, move about as they do on those friezes, and place them on

canvases organized by harmonies of color (Georges Seurat). As Seurat said, he wanted to

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paint modern people in their typical traits in his paintings. He might be implying that he is not

making any interpretations or irony to the French society, but rather, as an artist, he was just

capturing the essential traits of the middle-class people on his canvas. As Lewis suggests in his

journal Seurat's La Grande Jatte: Fashion And Irony, a Sunday on La Grand Jatte simply be a

delivery of the taste of fashion with the figures being in harmony with the scenery background.

Despite the different interpretations for the painting, one thing we can be sure about is

that Seurat was influenced by science and the color theorist Michel Chevreul. One of the easily

understoodable color theories explained by Michel Chevreul was dark and light oppositions

enhance each other, any color is likewise heightened when placed beside its

complementlocated on the opposite side of the color wheel (Seurat and the Making of La

Grande Jatte). A common example is that red and green and complement colors, when they are

put together, green will appear greener and red will appear redder. This color theory not only

influenced Seurat but also influenced the other Impressionist artists. In a Sunday on La Grand

Jatte, on the green grassland, people who are wearing orange to red clothing are more noticeable

as the red seems redder. On the other hand, the green grassland is complemented by the red

clothing as well and the whole painting present a harmony scene to the audience. Using

mathematics, the composition of a Sunday on La Grande Jatte is perfectly balanced and

carefully proportioned. For example, the foremost right couple, the girl in a white dress with her

mother, and a man in orange suite are standing on the same straight line, but the size of these

figures are in perfect ratio which shows that Seurat is a master of utilizing mathematics in his

paintings. Geometry is also utilized to balance the composition of the figures in the painting.
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The invention of pointillism enhances the use of light and shade. As we can find out on a

Sunday on La Grande Jatte, everything we see is composed by thousands of dots. As the sun is

shining from the sky, Seurat presents his master of skills by using different colors to depict the

shade. In the foreground of the painting, the shade appears in a dark green color, which is also

the deepest of all the colors of shades in the painting. From the middle ground to the background

of the painting, the shade faints which helps to show that the audience is farther and farther away

from the background.

Seurat is also an expert of blending. Since he is already using dots to paint the canvas, it

is even more difficult to blend well using different colors. But we can see many examples of he

again shows his expertise in his skills. For example, on the traces of trees where they become

less and less white as the sun is shining from the left side of the painting, the blend of white dots

and green dots become a more yellowish color for human eyes, while Seurat's technique means

that such tiny dots of white are placed next to dots of green until the relevant effect is actualized

(A Sunday Afternoon). By applying the color wheel here, yellow is the color that is next to

green but with a paler tone. Hence we can see how the colors of trees change from the outmost

green to yellow, then to the innermost white.

Everyone may different interpretations for the figures presented in a Sunday on La

Grande Jatte and the real meaning of this painting. But no matter this painting represents

Seurats irony to the 1880s society or he was just capturing the typical traits of middle class

people on his canvas, a Sunday on La Grande Jatte is no doubt a masterpiece of his that

showcases his expertise of utilizing science in art.

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Works Cited

A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Artble, 14 Aug. 2015. Accessed on May

2, 2017.

Lewis, Adrian. Seurat's La Grande Jatte: Fashion And Irony. Art History, vol.

29, no.5, 2006. Accessed on May 2, 2017.

Platzer, David. "Sunday in the Park: the Immense Preliminary Labour that Seurat Devoted to the

Composition of His Monumental Paintings is Analysed in an Exhibition at the Art

Institute of Chicago on the Making of His Most Celebrated Painting, A Sunday on La

Grande Jatte." Apollo, Sept. 2004. Accessed on May 2, 2017.

Seurat and the Making of La Grande Jatte. The Art Institute of Chicago, June 2004. Accessed

on May 2, 2017.

The Private Life of a Masterpiece. Series 4, Georges Seurat: A Sunday Afternoon on the Island

of La Grande Jatte. BBC, 2005. Accessed on May 2, 2017.