Alfred Sisley | Impressionist landscape painter

Alfred Sisley (30 October 1839 - 29 January 1899) was an Impressionist landscape painter who was born and spent most of his life in France, but retained British citizenship.

He was the most consistent of the Impressionists in his dedication to painting landscape en plein air (i.e., outdoors).

He deviated into figure painting only rarely and, unlike Renoir and Pissarro, he found that Impressionism fulfilled his artistic needs.

Among his important works are a series of paintings of the River Thames, mostly around Hampton Court, executed in 1874, and landscapes depicting places in or near Moret-sur-Loing.

The notable paintings of the Seine and its bridges in the former suburbs of Paris are like many of his landscapes, characterised by tranquillity, in pale shades of green, pink, purple, dusty blue and cream.

Over the years Sisley's power of expression and colour intensity increased.

Alfred Sisley concentrated on landscape more consistently than any other Impressionist painter.

He was inspired by the style and subject matter of previous modern painters Camille Pissarro and Edouard Manet.

Among the Impressionists, Sisley has been overshadowed by Monet, whose work his resembles in style and subject matter, although Sisley's effects are more subdued.

Described by art historian Robert Rosenblum as having "almost a generic character, an impersonal textbook idea of a perfect Impressionist painting", his work strongly invokes atmosphere, and his skies are always impressive.