Book excerpt: Impressionism -- the interpretation of nature through color and light -- was the most powerful influence on American painters until after World War II. William H. Gerdts offers here an overview of the movement, followed by 66 superb full-page colorplates, each accompanied by an informative commentary. He begins with Mary Cassatt and moves to John Singer Sargent. Discussed next are the artists who worked in Giverny, France, under the influence of Money -- Theodore Robinson, John Leslie Breck, and Dawson Dawson-Watson. Gerdts then considers Childe Hassam, Julian Alden Weir, William Merritt Chase, and John Twachtman, as well as various groups such as the Old Lyme, Connecticut, art colony; the Society of Ozark Painters, and artists working on the West Coast. He concludes with the second generation of Americans in Giverny, Frederick Frieseke and Richard Miller. -- Form publisher's description.