Impressionism is a movement in painting that originated in France in the 1860s. and largely determined the development of art of the 19th century. The central figures of this movement were Manet, Monet, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro, Sisley, and the post-impressionists - Van Gogh, Cezanne, Gauguin, Toulouse-Lautrec - contributed a special role to the history of painting. The contribution of each of them to its development is unique - they created a pictorial system that was innovative for its time. The impressionists opposed the conventions of academicism, affirmed the beauty of everyday reality, simple, democratic motives, and sought to convey fleeting impressions, richness of colors, psychological nuances, mobility and variability of the atmosphere of the surrounding world through the means of art.