The Academie des Beaux-Art
- The Academie des Beaux-arts is French for Academy of fine arts.
- Salon de Paris art exhibitions were held at the Palais des Beaux-Arts every two years.
- It was created in 1648 under King Louis XIV to educate the most talented students in drawing, painting, sculpture, engraving, architecture and other media.
- The annual salons were set for artistic trends and were a source of national pride.
- The Academie set the standards for French art by determining what types of paintings were acceptable and which were not.
- Academie had expectations for the techniques artists should use, such as painting in somber, conservative tones rather than broad or bright hues, using symmetrical compositions and hard outlines, and creating smooth surfaces that showed no traces of brushstrokes.
- Instead of concerning about historical or religious subjects, the impressionists were concerned with contemporary subjects and the new realities of modernity.