Impressionist artists in nineteenth-century Paris emphasized the accurate depiction of light. This movement led to artists finding beauty in the day to day of the developing French city. It is no surprise, therefore, that Impressionism was related to another French invention from around the same time-- photography. An Impressionist artist may look at a scene and recognize its beauty without being able to identify each element. Photography allows the subject to be captured as it was, preserving the image so that it can be enjoyed longer than the few fleeting moments in which it happened. As put by the French poet Charles Baudelaire “The goal of art is to distill the eternal from the transitory.” While Baudelaire was highly skeptical of photography, it is actually this medium that allows the eternal beauty of a transitory moment to be preserved perfectly.

In the spirit of Impressionism, I made a conscious effort to find an image which captured a beautiful but transitory scene. I believe that A Cold City on a Calm River contains many small details which mark it as an Impressionist image. These details go unnoticed at a first glance but are important in shaping the image. In any photograph, lighting is the critical first factor, without which even the most beautiful scene could not be captured. In this photo, the lighting lends itself to a lot of detail while still preserving the overcast weather. Secondly, what makes this photo so beautiful is the combination of the eternal and transitory evoked by Baudelaire. The lighting brings into focus the winter haze and the bareness of the trees against the river on the lower right. Against the natural details, cars speed along a highway, reminding us that this was just a short moment in time. The ephemeral components are contrasted by the more permanent ones: the river and the century-old bridge in the foreground.

This photo also portrays the beauty contained in even a drab winter morning. Traditionally this same scene would be taken during the spring, depicting green trees and a sunny blue sky. This tradition implies that world is only beautiful a couple of moments out of the year. This photo subverts that expectation and captures an image which does not fit the viewer’s preconceptions. Hopefully this photo inspires people to look at their surroundings in a new light and appreciate the beauty of each new day.