Industrialization Strikes France Hard
In order to understand why Seurat would negatively comment on industry through his art, we should first look at the rise of industry in late nineteenth-century France. Although industry became an issue before the birth of Seurat, its repercussions were still evident during his life time as industrialization revolutionized the socio-economic statues of France by transforming an agrarian community to one based on machinery. The resulting change in demographics was also significant as 35 percent of the population lived in cities in 1888 as opposed to only 24 percent in 1843, showing a mass migration to the cities during this time period of 1843 until 1888 (Thomson 52). 
Living in the suburbs of Paris throughout most of these years, Seurat was able to observe the change in population density in the city as he grew older. This was significant because with this migration to Paris, serious problems arose such as pollution and over-population. From this vantage point, Seurat saw the “gradual encroachment of the metropolis on the countryside” that Zimmerman alludes to in Seurat and the Art Theory of His Time (Zimmerman 73). The “encroachment” benefited the economy of France, but it had many negative social implications for the working class. Specifically, during the time in which these advances in industry occurred, debates about “La Question Sociale” regarding the problems of the working-class became relevant in Parisian politics (Thomson 53).
With these debates arising from the problems of industrialization, Seurat’s proximity to the problem forced him to take notice of societal changes. Because of his attention, through the years of 1880 to 1884 the subject of Seurat’s work dealt with the changes of industry, specifically the role of the worker in French society.
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