“The Honest Eye: Camille Pissarro’s Impressionism” is an ambitious and impressive move by the Denver Art Museum, an example of what a mid-sized cultural institution can achieve when it sticks to its mission and takes a few risks.
And, no doubt, it is quite a dare, even if this sweeping retrospective is centered around one of the most famous artists who ever lived.
The crunch point? Pissarro himself. Though respected to stratospheric levels and widely understood as a groundbreaker, he does not have the level of celebrity that would immediately draw enough visitors — in both attendance and ticket sales — to support a solo show so expensive to produce. His Q Score cannot compete with that of his 19th-century peers who also only need go by their last names, such as Monet, with his beloved water lilies, or Degas, with his precious ballet dancers
Simply put, Pissarro is nobody’s favorite Impressionist. His work lacks the flash and the signature moves that draw fans to those others, even those Impressionists who may have smaller reputations. Mary Cassatt is known for her soft domestic scenes that make viewers sigh. Gustave Caillebotte painted those exciting scenes of urban life in Paris.
The masses know Pissarro’s name but not his actual work. DAM acknowledges as much in the show’s media materials, noting he was good at depicting “scenes of the mundane.” That is not exactly how you sell things in 2025.
This exhaustive exhibition may not change Pissarro’s notoriety, but it gives him a fighting chance. It argues that Pissarro had equal, and possibly more original, talent than any other artist of his day.
Backing this assertion is a global effort. “The Honest Eye” was co-organized by the Museum Barberini in Potsdam, Germany, and “the exhibition brings together more than 100 paintings and objects from nearly 50 international museums and private collections, alongside six works from the DAM’s holdings,” the museum touts in its media materials.
In addition to works from private collectors, there are loaners borrowed from such esteemed institutions as the National Gallery of London, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Musée d’Orsay in Paris, and the National Gallery of Art, in Washington, D.C. Curators have to earn the trust of these places in order to get the work, then they have to transport it.
But it was orchestrated by a high-level team: DAM’s Clarisse Fava-Piz, associate curator of European and American Art before 1900; Claire Durand-Ruel, an independent art historian; and Nerina Santorius, head of Impressionism at the Museum Barberini (who picked up where her predecessor Daniel Zamani left off before departing the same job).
According to DAM, the show is the first comprehensive museum exhibit of Pissarro’s work in 30 years at a U.S. museum. In that way, it is a landmark by its very existence.
But is it a blockbuster? It is hard to know if people will show up in the way we think of them flocking to solos by the other stars of Impressionism. But there is ample reason to do so.
“The Honest Eye” frames Pissarro as a man of the people. He was at the center of the Impressionist movement and one of its elders, the only artist to present work at all eight of the now-legendary Impressionist exhibitions in Paris. The other painters looked to him as an adviser; he was a global star.
But many of his pictures focused on the not-so-famous. The exhibition is broken into multiple sections, but the most relevant to his career takes on the bland title of “Rural Community: Harvest and Market Scenes.” That is exactly what they are.
There is “The Pork Butcher,” from 1883, focusing on a female figure ardently carving away at some dead bit of meat. Nearby is “Washerwoman, from 1881; “The Shepherdess,” from 1881; and “The Poultry Market,” from 1882. The titles say it all.
In every instance, the subjects display the virtues of hard work and everyday heroism. Their aura reflects the painter’s own idea that peasants and laborers were worthy subjects of his oil paintings, rather than the wealthy nobles and larger-than-life deities that dominated much of painting before then.
The idea was as revolutionary as the loose, emotional brush strokes of the Impressionists overall, and another break from the formalities of painting past.
The show is not all so ordinary in its wares. The first section will likely be a revelation to art fans who do not know Pissarro’s unique past.
He was born “the son of Jewish merchants in Charlotte Amalie, a thriving Danish-controlled free port city on the Caribbean Island of Saint Thomas,” and traveled to Venezuela in his youth. This opening section includes scenes from those places, distant in look and feel from the later works, set in France, that the Impressionists were known for.
And the last section of the show, which visitors encounter after strolling through various galleries that are arranged, to some degree, chronologically, is something of a showstopper. “City People: Paris Series,” as it is labeled, shows Pissarro at his crowd-pleasing best, capturing urban environments around Paris and other cities, including Rouen, the inspiration for so many artists.
He depicted steamboats hunkered on the shores of “Sunset, Port of Rouen,” from 1898; the urban landscape in “Roofs of Old Rouen,” in 1896; the bridge “Pont Boieldieu, Rouen, Effect of Fog,” in 1898.
These are the kind of objects that Impressionist fans crave, and Pissarro delivered them in the last years of his life.
In the same way, “The Honest Eye: Camille Pissarro’s Impressionism” delivers a well-organized look at his entire output. It gets there slowly, patiently, but it surely gets there. That is where this show’s dare really exists. It does the work, and the work takes time, and the rewards are many.
And for museum visitors, it is a rare opportunity to go a bit deeper. To reacquaint themselves with an old friend they thought they knew, but perhaps did not. It may be another 30 years before this chance comes around again.
IF YOU GO
“The Honest Eye: Camille Pissarro’s Impressionism” continues through Feb. 6 at the Denver Art Museum. Info: 720-865-5000 or denverartmuseum.org.