Post-Impressionism started in the late 1880s by artists influenced by the Impressionist movement but inspired to paint emotions and use optical illusions to portray these emotions. The majority of Post-Impressionists lived in France. Living in France, many Post-Impressionists painted French nature scenes and people, though some were inspired by religion, tropical landscapes and other more symbolic and abstract ideas. The movement came to an end by the beginning of World War I.
There are several well-known artists of the Post-Impressionism movement. Paul Cezanne believed that there was a hidden order in nature and that one should not try to create an illusion of foreground and background in nature scenes. Georges Seurat invented pointillism, in which an artist uses small dots of color to paint a picture; paints are not mixed, but colors side by side appear mixed. Vincent van Gogh painted a twisted reality filled with emotion and symbolism. Other famous Post-Impressionists are Paul Gauguin, August Rodin and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
Post-Impressionists were greatly inspired by the Impressionism movement, but felt that this painting style had limitations. Because of this, Post-Impressionists built their art by adding unique touches to an Impressionist style. One could say that Post-Impressionism does not evoke a single distinct style, but is an umbrella term for artists between 1880 and 1900 influenced by Impressionism, who created emotionally-charged and symbolic art. Many artists had philosophical theories about nature and lighting that they applied to their painting to create works that were new and unique. Some artists painted how they felt about a scene rather than how they saw it.
"Starry Night," painted in 1889 by Vincent van Gogh, is one of the most famous Post-Impressionist paintings. This is an abstract painting of the sky seen from a hilltop. The sky and stars swirl and cypress trees loom over the artist on the hill. Georges Seurat's "A Sunday Afternoon on the Île de la Grande Jatte" painted in 1884 reflects upon people sitting and picnicking by a stream using the pointillism technique. Many of Paul Gauguin's paintings were done in Tahiti. A famous painting of his is called "Two Tahitian Women" and portrays the virtue of native women by creating "the Tahitian Eve."