By the time Georges Seurat (1859 1891) died at only 32, in just over a decade he had revolutionized technique in painting, spearheaded a new movement, Neoimpressionism, and bought a degree of scienti c rigor to his investigations of color that would prove profoundly in uential well into this century. As a student at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, Seurat read Chevreul's 1839 book on the theory of color and this, along with his own analysis of Delacroix' paintings and the aesthetic observations of scientist Charles Henry, led him to formulate the concept of Divisionism. This was a method of painting around colour contrasts in which shade and tone are built up through dots of paint (pointillism) that emphasise the complex interrelation of light and shadow. The two paintings that re ect Seurat's investigations in this area more than any others, 1884's "Bathers at A snieres" and 1886's "A Sunday Afternoon at the Ile de La Grande Jatte," are also two of his most famous the latter is arguably one
