B.

The works in this exhibition have been drawn from the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria, which has the finest collection of international art in the southern hemisphere. The show features artists whose works inspire the admiration of the non-gallery goer as readily as they do the art historian.

It includes internationally important paintings by Cézanne, Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Signac, Sisley, Turner, Constable, Corot and Courbet.

The light-filled works of the French Impressionists are widely admired but, like any art movement, those artists did not develop their style in isolation - they were influenced by those who came before and had a profound influence on those who followed.

This exhibition presents a rare opportunity to travel the artistic journey that begins with the forerunners of impressionism and continues to the beginning of the modernist movement. In doing so, it traces some of the key developments of 19th century art.

An exhibition not to be missed, The Allure of Light allows us to marvel at the distinctly impressionist treatment of light in the work of the great English artist J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851), who was painting decades earlier than the great French impressionists. It also shows how a shared interest in light and structure unites the otherwise very different styles of many of the post-impressionist artists. The exhibition culminates in The Uphill Road, a carefully ordered study of light on the French Pontoise landscape by the first of the modernists, Paul Cézanne (1839–1906).

Indemnified by the New Zealand Government and proudly supported by:

The Community Trust
National Gallery of Victoria
Sir Robertson and Lady Stewart
Acoustiguide of Australia Pty Ltd

Exhibition number 699