One picture changes the course of art

Taking Claude Monet’s famous painting *Impression, soleil levant* (1872, Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris) as a starting point, this article traces the origins of the term ‘Impressionism’. Originally intended as a term of derision, it soon became a key concept of modernism. A detailed analysis of the painting and contemporary reactions reveal how perception, painting techniques and the understanding of art underwent a fundamental transformation in the 1870s – and how Monet thereby ushered in a turning point in art.