|
Claude Monet was born on November 14, 1840,
in Paris, but he spent most of his childhood in Le
Havre. There, in his teens, he studied drawing; he
also painted seascapes outside with the French
painter Eugene Louis Boudin. By 1859 Monet had
committed himself to a career as an artist and
began to spend as much time in Paris as
possible.
Working outside, Monet painted simple
landscapes and scenes of contemporary
middle-class society. As his style developed,
however, Monet violated one traditional artistic
convention after another in the interest of direct
artistic expression. His experiments in rendering
outdoor sunlight with a direct, sketchlike
application of bright color became more and
more daring.
In 1874 Monet and his colleagues decided to
appeal directly to the public by organizing
their own exhibition. They called themselves
independents, but the press soon derisively
labeled them impressionists because their work
seemed sketchy and unfinished (like a first
impression). During the 1870s and 1880s Monet
gradually refined his technique, and he made
many trips to scenic areas of France, especially
the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts, to study
the most brilliant effects of light and color
possible.
By the mid-1880s Monet, generally regarded
as the leader of the impressionist school, had
achieved significant recognition and financial
security. Despite the boldness of his color and
the extreme simplicity of his compositions, he
was recognized as a master of meticulous
observation, an artist who sacrificed neither the
true complexities of nature nor the intensity of his
own feelings. In 1890 he was able to purchase
some property in the village of Giverny, not far
from Paris, and there he began to construct a
water garden (now open to the public)—a lily
pond arched with a Japanese bridge and
overhung with willows and clumps of bamboo.
Beginning in 1906, paintings of the pond and the
water lilies occupied him for the remainder of his
life. Throughout these years he also worked on
his other celebrated “series” paintings, groups of
works representing the same subject—haystacks,
poplars, Rouen Cathedral, the river Seine—seen
in varying light, at different times of the day or
seasons of the year. Despite failing eyesight,
Monet continued to paint almost up to the time
of his death, on December 5, 1926, at Giverny
|
|
|
