Pleinairisme (English: pleinairisme, French)

Plein air is the idea of ​​painting outdoors from start to finish, placing emphasis on the effects of bright, fresh light and colors, and painters who adopt this method are collectively called plein air artists. This term is most closely related to landscape painting, and although there are precedents such as Turner, Constable, Corot, and Millet, it was most enthusiastically and fruitfully pursued in France from the second half of the 19th century onwards. Almost all Impressionist landscape painters, including Monet, took this position, and their direct predecessors were Courbet, Jongkind, and Boudin. In the West, the tradition of landscape painting was to base it on sketching on site and then finish the oil painting under artificial light in the studio. However, with the emergence of modern positivist thought, the idea of ​​realism, which aimed to calmly and objectively depict nature as it is, became stronger in the history of painting. Attention was also paid to the various effects of light on the shapes and colors of objects, and to the degree of humidity and dryness of the atmosphere. Combined with doubts about traditional painting methods, plein air painting began to be adopted by many talented painters in the 1850s and 1860s as an innovative way of thinking. Tonal division and other Impressionist theories also appeared almost inevitably as an extension of this way of thinking. The style of painting that Kuroda Seiki and Kume Keiichiro brought back to Japan from France at the end of the 19th century was a kind of plein air painting, and strictly speaking there are many aspects that make it difficult to recognize as Impressionism.

[Tadashi Ikegami]

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

戸外の明るくて清新な光や色彩の効果を重視して、作品を終始戸外で描こうとする考え方を外光主義といい、そうした制作方法をとる画家たちを総称して外光派という。風景画制作にもっともかかわりの深いことばで、ターナーやコンスタブル、コローやミレーといった先例がありはするが、19世紀後半以降のフランスでもっとも熱心で実り豊かな追求がなされた。モネを初めとする印象派の風景画家はほとんどすべてこの立場をとっており、彼らを直接に先駆した画家としてはクールベ、ヨンキントそしてブーダンがあげられる。西洋では、現場での写生を基礎として、アトリエ内の人工的な光線のもとで油絵を仕上げるというのが、風景画制作の伝統であった。だが近代的な実証主義思潮の登場とともに、絵画史のうえでもあるがままの自然を冷静かつ客観的に描こうとする写実主義の考え方が強まり、光が物の形および色彩に及ぼすもろもろの作用や、大気の乾湿の度合いにも注意が向けられ、伝統的な制作法への疑問とも相まって、外光主義は1850、60年代に革新的な考え方として多くの優秀な画家によって採用され始めた。色調分割その他印象派の理論も、この考え方の延長線にほぼ必然的な形で現れてくることとなる。黒田清輝(せいき)や久米桂一郎(くめけいいちろう)がフランスから19世紀末の日本に持ち帰った画風も一種の外光主義であって、厳密には印象主義と認めがたい点が多いといわざるをえない。

［池上忠治］

出典　小学館　日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)について　情報 | 凡例