Oh my gosh what a book! This is the catalogue from the exhibit that LACMA hosted during the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, when the Musee dOrsay was being renovated and its paintings were allowed to travel to Los Angeles and Chicago. Full disclosure- I was a recent college graduate and art history major employed by the LACMA press office in 1984 during the Olympics and gave tours of this exhibit to the press corps, so these paintings are near and dear to my heart. I had the catalogue from the exhibit but had never read the whole thing- I only now took the time to read it before and after a trip to Paris and visit to the Musee dOrsay. And what a wonderful read this book was, putting the painters in their historical context, discussing the cultural and art historical works that produced the Impressionists, and looking at each painting in depth. A fantastic book.