Paul Signac
It was Claude Monet's exhibition of 1880 that caused Paul Signac to leave school to become an Impressionist. Signac followed Monet's dashed style of painting at the time; the precise structure of his still life on a mostly rising tabletop (that we present today) is the most demanding of those of the early 1880s.
The blue-green book on the front edge of the table with the recognizable title, Au Soleil, is the defining feature of the picture. The well-read Paul Signac, whose library was mentioned in the first biographies, certainly did not choose it for this still life just because of the color. Guy de Maupassant's travelog, published the year before, corresponded to his life plan. Signac would later move to the Mediterranean and travel all his life. In 1884, however, he first took part in the first Salon of Independent Artists and met Georges Seurat. With him he developed the technique of Divisionism.
If you love Pointillists and Post-Impressionists as much as we do, please check our legendary 2024 DailyArt calendars, full of beautiful artworks, in the DailyArt Shop!
P.S. Post-Impressionists loved to paint still lifes, perhaps because it allowed them to experiment with color and technique. Check out these delicious fruit still lifes by Paul Cézanne and compare them with still lifes by Paul Gauguin!