“
It was an exhilarating time to be involved in the art world, in any capacity. At last, individualism was encouraged, not condemned. By the 1880s, Impressionism was yesterday’s news. Artists had already gone beyond it, and were experimenting with new forms, content and techniques. Diversity was the modus vivendi. Accordingly, 1880s Paris became the birthplace of some radically different movements, including Divisionism, Symbolism, Synthesism and Nabis. Furthermore, the proliferation of alternative exhibiting bodies offered real grounds for hope for avant-garde painters and those hailing from the fringes of society. The Salon was no longer the sole and hazardous rite of passage lying between a painter and success. There were now other organisations where reputations could be forged, such as the Société des Aquarellistes Français. But by far the most notable and innovative artistic venture in 1884 was the Salon des Artistes Indépendants.
When his technically daring composition Bathers at Asnières (1884) was rejected by the jury of the 1884 Salon, former pupil of the prestigious École des Beaux-Arts Georges Seurat was spurred to retaliate. Joining forces with a number of other disgruntled painters, among them Symbolist Odilon Redon and self-taught artist Albert Dubois-Pillet, Seurat helped found the Groupe des Artistes Indépendants. With Redon acting as chairman, the group proposed to do something unprecedented: they would mount a show whose organisers were not answerable to any official institution, and where there would be no prizes and, significantly, no jury. The venture introduced a radically new concept onto the Parisian art scene: freedom. The first exhibition, the Salon des Artistes Indépendants, was held from May to July in a temporary building in the Jardin des Tuileries near the Louvre.
”
”