An Exploration Of The Idea Of "reconciliation" In Symbolist Painting

Symbolism painting appeared in the middle of the 19 th century.Symbolism artists have a common faith and aesthetic concept.They used suggestive expression in their paintings to pursue the spiritual world beyond the transcendental reality,forming a group of symbolism painting with diverse styles and breaking the boundaries of time and region.The Correspondances is an important concept of symbolism aesthetics.It puts forward that there is a close connection between the material world and the spiritual world 、the human senses 、the human and the nature.As an important aesthetic thought of symbolism painting,the Correspondances has a profound expression in symbolism painting,such as form,style and spiritual connotation.Through the study of symbolist paintings,it can be found that the Correspondances brought about changes and inspirations to the painting of that time.In order to make the study more in-depth,this paper chooses three typical symbolist painters as cases to analyze and explore,respectively Gustav Moreau、Paul Gauguin and Ferdinand Hodler,their art can represent some key nodes in the development of symbolist painting.Moreau’s paintings practiced the Correspondances.He was committed to achieving the spiritual realm and state of poetic flavour through painting elements such as color、 composition,paving the way for symbolism painting at the ideological level and stating the artistic theory.Gauguin had make a breakthrough contribution to symbolism painting,and his“Synthetic Symbolism” had bring innovation to painting techniques.The color、composition and the expression of some painting techniques coincide with the aesthetic view of the Correspondances.Hodler’s paintings focused on human’s belief and consciousness of existence,the communication between human and nature,and the spiritual world exploration with religious meaning.He conveied the Correspondances with his unique“parallelism” painting style.The analysis of three painters will bring a more multidimensional understanding to the study of the Correspondances in symbolist painting.Through the above investigation of the relationship between symbolism painting and the Correspondances,this paper further reflects on the relationship between creation and thought,then inspires the practice of painting.