La sortie du Salon, au Palais de l’Industrie 1890

Jean Béraud made this oil painting to capture a scene outside the Palais de l’Industrie, a symbol of the industrial age. Béraud uses the traditional medium of oil paint to record a contemporary subject, and this gives us a lot to think about. Notice how the artist applies paint in layers to build up a hazy atmosphere, and the architectural details of the Palais, contrasting the solidity of the building with the fleeting nature of the crowd. The brushstrokes themselves are quite visible, especially in the sky and foliage. This gives the painting a sense of immediacy, as if Béraud captured the scene in a single breath. But of course, that’s an illusion. What you're really seeing is the artist's labor, the slow accumulation of skilled gestures. This is true not only of the painting itself, but also the clothing of the well-to-do people depicted. The image suggests a parallel between the work involved in making a painting, and the many different kinds of work that went into the industrial revolution itself.