"The Beach at Berck," oil on canvas by Edouard Manet, 1873. On view in "The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting Along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874" at UMMA through January 3, 2010.

Image courtesy of UMMA.

Geography is often crucial to understanding history. And as the University of Michigan Museum of Art’s “The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874” shows us, geography is equally important to the history of art.

Only a few areas have the historic significant of Normandy; the pivotal years of 1066 and 1944 come immediately to mind. But as anyone who has traveled this area can tell you, Normandy is also uncommonly lovely. Not exotic — luxuriant. Not stunning — soothing.

“The Lens of Impressionism,” which opens Saturday, is an impressive example of art, landscape, and technology richly intertwining in a manner that’s exceptional in the history of art and ideas.

As the UMMA’s gallery statement tells us, the exhibit “advances a new argument for the origins of what was called ‘the new painting,’ namely that a unique convergence of forces — social, artistic, technological, and commercial — along the Normandy coast of France that dramatically transformed the course of photography and painting.

“Within this framework the invention of the camera and the development of early fine art photography in that particular setting will be seen as the specific catalysts that brought about a new approach to painting.”

While the premise itself isn’t particularly novel, what is fruitfully new is this exhibit’s pulling together of original artworks to validate the claim that the roots of modernism arguably lays as much in Normandy as it does Paris. As such, the display features “paintings, photographs, and drawings by some of the most treasured artists in the Western canon — Gustave Courbet, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet and Edgar Degas among them — as well as pioneering photographers such as Gustave Le Gray and Henri Le Secq.”

Well, this is indeed first-class. And enough so that the exhibit will head to the Dallas Museum of Art after leaving Ann Arbor to pass word of this historiographical scholarship.

The crucial word in this exhibit is “lens" — as in eye, as well as in camera. Because technology indeed took a pivotal turn in mid-19th century France, with the invention of photography and its impact on painting.

Artists have always been the lens of humanity. Even today, the inclination of most art viewers is to consider how this or that artist views humanity.

Yet despite such time-honored aesthetic advancements as contrapposto posture (where the human figure is shown standing with most of its weight on one foot off-axis to give the figure a more dynamic appearance) as well as perspective (as illustrated in the work of Vermeer, for example), there has always been an uneasy feeling that artists (like all humans) are incapable of crafting a neutral — that is, objective — appearance of physical reality.

There is, therefore, an underlying tension in the artworks on display in “The Lens of Impressionism,” because there could be no question about this notion of “objectivity” after this crucial period of history. We're getting a firsthand opportunity here to look at the works of proto-impressionists — as well as the transition into impressionism itself — on two levels: first, as an initial reaction to photographic technology; and second, as a determined attempt to come to grips with the implications of this new medium for artists and art itself.

The selections on display are therefore fascinating for their historic and artistic context. For example, Gustave Coubert’s 1869 oil on canvas “The Wave” is a keen example of this famed realist’s illustration of the Normandy coastline with the painting’s ominous cloudbank set above an equally ferocious curling tide. By contrast, impressionist Claude Monet’s earlier (1865) oil on canvas “Green Wave” finds him already pushing the boundaries of his art with a painting largely devoted to the wave itself, with a trio of sailboats being crafting with degrees of abstraction.

"Hotel des Roches Noires, Trouville," Oil on canvas by Claude Monet, 1870. On view in "The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting Along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874" at UMMA through January 3, 2010.

Image courtesy of UMMA.

While there are some excellent examples of French painting illustrating the lives of Normandy’s inhabitants and tourists at the time — Eugene Boudin’s 1864 oil on wood “Bathing Time at Deauville” and Claude Monet’s 1870 oil on canvas “Hotel des Roches Noires, Trouville” come immediately to mind — the exhibit’s strength lies in the photography of Normandy’s countryside and shoreline.

Henri Le Secq’s 1854 “Dieppe, the Harbor at Low Tide” and “Dieppe, the Harbor and Jetties” give us a mid-19th century view of Normandy that painting found difficult to match. There’s an unvarnished verisimilitude in these photographs that’s jarring to this day.

Which ultimately leads to another consideration raised by this remarkable exhibit: “The Lens of Impressionism” ultimately shows us that artists and photographers couldn’t initially account for whether or not the photograph is an accurate depiction of reality.

The refinement of the photographic lens merely proved that artistic perspective is intrinsically a matter of aesthetic preference. As experiments began to show, the view selected by the photographer and the image captured by the photographic lens are not necessarily the same thing. And it’s this profound paradox — contrasted with the Norman historical moment—that makes this exhibit a fascinating peephole into this crucial juncture in the history of art.

“The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874,” continues through Jan. 3 at the University of Michigan Museum of Art, 525 S. State St. Museum hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday; 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Thursday and Friday; and noon-5 p.m. Sunday. For information, call 734-763-UMMA.

John Carlos Cantú is a free-lance writer who reviews art for AnnArbor.com.