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ISBN: 978-1-78525-698-1

Nathalia Brodskaïa and Nina Kalitina

Claude Monet

Volume 2

Photograph of Claude and Alice Monet in
Piazza San Marco, feeding the pigeons.

After a postcard from 1908.

Formerly Jean-Pierre Hoschedé Collection.

Contents

His Life – The Pinnacle and the Crises

His Life – His Series

Works in Focus

The Time after Impressionism

Post-Impressionism

Post-Impressionism and Its Contributions

The Post-Impressionist Period: Background and Ambience

Neo-Impressionism

Artists Influenced by Monet

Paul Cézanne (1839-1906)

Henri Rousseau (1844-1910)

Vincent van Gogh

Paul Gauguin (1848-1903)

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864-1901)

The Nabis

Monet’s Role in Art History

Biography

List of Illustrations

The Boat, 1887. Oil on canvas, 146 x 133 cm.

Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris.

His Life – The Pinnacle
and the Crises

Like many artists of his day and earlier times, Monet repeatedly sojourned and worked on the coast of Normandy, where Delacroix and Courbet had once painted many marine scenes. Between 1883 and 1886 Monet often visited Étretat and produced many of his seascapes. Their recurrent motif is a cliff jutting out far into the sea, as in Cliffs at Étretat (1886, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), which was done from the d’Amont rock near the Payen house.

The coastal town Étretat inspired several of Monet’s seascapes and landscapes. Monet was not the only painter at the time to travel to the north of France in search of inspiration for his works. Both Delacroix and Courbet had already painted in Étretat, and Monet owned a watercolour by Delacroix.

Among them, Courbet, Pissaro, Manet, and Renoir also travelled to the Normandy coast. Monet frequently met with the writer and fellow Étretat resident Maupassant, who set most of his short stories in his hometown. The close relationship between art and literature and the two-sided influence between the disciplines during the 19th century is clear.

In his later works, created on the north-western French coast, Monet captured spectacular views of the sea and the beach life in all of its rawness.

Among the steep cliffs on the various coastal areas, he directed his attention on three natural arches, Porte d’Aval, Manneporte, and Porte d’Amont, and the seven-metre needle.

Because of the great interest, numerous artists on the Normandy coast consider the Manneporte as one of the most-often-portrayed rock formations.

Monet alone painted six images of the Manneporte, which can be seen as an important step towards his series. Of which The Manneporte near Étretat (vol. 1, p. 237) and The Manneporte (Étretat) (vol. 1, p. 238) are integral.

His hometown Le Havre, a place he held deeply in his heart, would again be close to him in 1868 when he settled nearby in Étretat with his future wife Camille Concieux and their son Jean, doing so again in 1883, 1885, and 1886.

The power of the blue-green, partially violet water that broke into waves along the coast is seen in his paintings. He captured the raw weather, with its sudden changes from sunny to cloudy, and portrayed the lives of the local fishermen and their simple boats, moored on the pebble beach, as in Three Fishing Boats (vol. 1, p. 199) Monet often took many canvasses to the beach, and during the course of the day, alternated between previously started paintings, with the purpose of capturing the original lighting. At the end, Monet edited his paintings in his workshop. Altogether, Monet completed over fifty works in Étretat.

Olive Trees in the Moreno Garden, 1884.

Oil on canvas, 65.4 x 81.2 cm. Private collection.

Antibes Seen from La Salis, 1888.

Oil on canvas, 73.3 x 92 cm.

Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo (Ohio).

In December 1883 he set out with Renoir for the Riviera. In 1884, after Bordighera and Menton, he returned to Étretat, where he also spent several months during the following summer.

The year 1886 was memorable for trips to Holland and Brittany; from January to April 1888 he lived on the Mediterranean coast at Antibes, before moving on to London and thence back to Étretat. These journeys were undoubtedly efforts to find new sources for his work, new and inspiring motifs.

Nevertheless, in all his wanderings, Monet remained resolutely faithful to the central principle of his art, trying to penetrate deep into Nature, to apprehend her secrets and convey them through vivid and direct perception.

After his arrival in Bordighera and exposure to the exotic nature of the south, he wrote to his second wife Alice: “My work is progressing, but I am experiencing difficulty; these palm-trees are a torment to me, and apart from that it is very hard to pick a motif and get it down on the canvas – there are such thickets all around.”

Monet’s fascination with the Mediterranean landscape reached its peak during the 1880s. During this time, he continually relocated from place to place, in search of new sources of inspiration.

After working in the French Riviera, Monet made a second trip to the south of France in 1884, in order to dedicate himself to the beauty of the Italian Riviera, where he completed The Castle at Dolceacqua (1884, Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris).

It portrays the small town of Dolceacqua in Liguria on the Italian Riviera with the ruins of the Doria Castle and a 14th-century bridge running across the riverbed of the Nervia.

Dolceacqua was the seat of power of the Doria family and home to Admiral Andrea Doria. The Doria family maintained dominion of the Republic of Genoa up until the 16th or 17th century.

The Dolceacqua Bridge (vol. 1, p. 222) and The Castle at Dolceacqua, done in a matter of hours, belong to a notable series of paintings in which Monet focused on this gem in the Italian province. In both of the paintings, Monet painted the arched bridge in the middle of the painting, flanked by the two riverbeds of the Nervia.

Cap d’Antibes, Mistral, 1888.

Oil on canvas, 65 x 81 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Antibes Seen from the Plateau Notre-Dame, 1888.

Oil on canvas, 65.7 x 81.3 cm. Juliana Cheney

Edwards Collection, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

The Alps Seen from Cap d’Antibes, 1888.

Oil on canvas, 65 x 81 cm. Private collection.

Antibes, Afternoon Effect, 1888. Oil on canvas, 66 x 82.5 cm.

Gift of Samuel Dacre Bush, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

On the right side of The Castle at Dolceacqua, the castle towers above the small city. The painting captures only the castle, as if Monet had painted it from a high angle. For The Dolceacqua Bridge, the perspective is so low that Monet could have been standing directly in the riverbed.

On the far-right margin of the painting, the exterior wall of a house is recognisable, and on the opposite end of the bridge, a tower protrudes over the building. The paintings differ not only in the motifs and perspective, but also slightly in colouring: darkly-nuanced colours in the former, while light brown and green tones are predominant in the latter.

The painting Dolceacqua (vol. 1, p. 221) portrays the old castle once again. Destroyed by the French and Spanish during the 18th century, the castle contributes to the charm of the small town and the medieval bridge.

The painter once described the small town near Ventimiglia as the ‘Jewel of Lightness’. He was enthralled with the raw beauty of the Italian hinterland, the luminous power of the sun, and the wild nature.

The fascinating originality of the village, which inspired Monet’s series, has not been displaced even to this day.

The observer can recognise the distinct atmosphere of the town and is taken in by Monet’s ability and creativity, and it succeeds in conveying the intrinsic form of lightness and warmth in the motifs.

However, during his trip to Italy, Monet not only worked in this small town, but also in the surrounding areas. In his impressive seascapes, he captured the expansive skies and views of the Alps.

Additionally, he painted views of the city of Ventimiglia and the Nervia Valley, whose atmospheric beauty reveals itself in Monet’s works.

The unparalleled vegetation, the exceptional light that captured the most vibrant colours, and the not-so-distant Mediterranean Sea provide an environment in which the artist found innumerable sources of inspiration.

The painting The Valley of the Nervia (vol. 1, p. 223) depicts a barren landscape, over which the imposing mountain peaks of the Alps hover.

Gardener’s House at Antibes, 1888. Oil on canvas, 66.3 x 93 cm.

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland.

The Esterel Mountains, 1888.

Oil on canvas, 65 x 92. The Courtauld Gallery, London.

The Nervia is adumbrated in the lower left corner, and blends with the blue tones of the surroundings.

Monet painted his works in typical Impressionist style, but under the influence of his own artistic feelings and with the assistance of a brilliant colour palette, which, in a special manner, echoes the Italian Riviera.

Following the end of his time in Italy, Monet again returned to places of his earlier productive periods, as well as new cities, such as London or Rouen, where he completed two of his most famous series.

He again travelled to Italy during the first decade of the 20th century. The purpose of the trip was to visit the lagoon city Venice, where Monet completed another powerful series.

Later Monet visited Antibes on the recommendation of the art dealer Durand-Ruel. In Antibes, Monet spent three months during the winter of 1888, during which time he completed a total of forty paintings.

The city of Monet’s inspiration would later be visited by other artists such as Picasso and Chagall. Fascinated by the light’s play on colours, by the vegetation found on the Mediterranean landscape, and by the impressive coast, every visitor managed to create masterpieces.

The artistic road found there today, which includes the various locations where these great artists worked, renders a glimpse into the landscape which they captured on canvas in various ways.

The painting Cap d’Antibes, Mistral portrays Antibes from afar. A few trees are scattered in the foreground, and in the background is the deep blue of the Mediterranean Sea and the vastness of the clear sky, bordered by the sublime majesty of the Alps. The beauty found in nature is not simply reflected in Monet’s works, but rather is intensified.

The works completed in Antibes portray a range of motifs, which Monet continually repainted at different times of day, capturing a wide array of colourful lighting. Amongst the motifs is the old fort, again, encircled by the blue of the water and by the Alps, or the sparse trees scattered along the coast, as seen in Beach in Juan-les-Pins.

The play of light and shadow are also areas of focus in his works. Monet mostly painted at the exact times of day at which light is equally both intense and contradictory: sunrise, sunset, and noon influenced his works. In this manner, Monet wanted to explore new avenues of art for the Impressionists. The images that appear to absorb the various facets of light illustrate Monet’s focus on painting light, and are therefore precursors to his later great series on haystacks, water lilies, and the Rouen Cathedral.

Villas at Bordighera, 1884.

Oil on canvas, 116.5 x 136.5 cm. Musée d’Orsay, Paris.

Fisherman’s House at Varengeville, 1882.

Oil on canvas, 60 x 78 cm. Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam.

The Mediterranean (Cap d’Antibes), 1888. Oil on canvas,

65 x 81 cm. Bequest of Frederick W. Schumacher,

Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus.

The Petite Creuse River, 1889.

Oil on canvas, 65.9 x 93.1 cm. Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago.

Alongside the aforementioned paintings, Monet portrayed the small region between Menton and Monaco: Cap Martin. In The Cap Martin (1884, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Tournai), he illustrates the Mediterranean turf, as the green-blue waves break the rocky, tree-covered coast – a beloved motif for Monet.

He also painted the deep blue sea on the coast, seen in Grande Bleue at Antibes (1888, Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel), and the view of Monaco, seen in La Baie de Monaco (1884, Nouveau Musée national de Monaco, Monaco). In 1883, Monet and Renoir arrived in Monaco, their first stop along the French Riviera, and the city Monet would later describe as the most beautiful place along the coast.

While at the Riviera, Monet intensified his practice of painting the same subject at different times of the day or under different weather conditions, ultimately completing over 125 paintings during his stays at the French and Italian Riviera. Despite Monet’s perpetual doubt in his ability to capture the Mediterranean light on canvas, his friend Theo van Gogh exhibited ten of his paintings from Antibes in 1888.

The southern light attracted many different artists of the most diverse character. The Impressionists were followed by the Pointillists, like Paul Signac and Henri Edmond Cross; later by the Fauvists, like André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck; and later still by Henri Matisse.

The paintings Monet completed in Antibes, and in other cities located in the Mediterranean, reflect, in contrast to his works done in northern France, a new facet of the artist’s oeuvre. One notices how deeply colour and light enraptured Monet, and it easily surmised how intensely his stay in the south would affect his later productive period.

Monet’s unbridled interest in the representation of light in all its diversity could evolve here. The time that Monet spent in southern France and northern Italy is not only based on the vast number of canvasses dedicated to these themes, which comprise a large portion of his oeuvre.

During the 1870s and 1880s, Monet spent much of his time in Brittany. In general the Breton islands were little frequented by artists of the 19th century, but Monet liked Belle-Île especially, the largest Breton island. This was the place where he sought and successfully found new landscapes and a new atmosphere.

Morning on the Seine, 1898. Oil on canvas, 73 x 91.5 cm.

The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo.

Morning on the Seine by Giverny, 1897.

Oil on canvas, 73.2 x 93 cm. Musée d’Orsay, Paris.

The rapidly changing weather conditions hindered him from painting at certain times of the day, as he usually did. Monet would also choose places that were difficult to reach.

Nevertheless, he was never deterred from painting a motif that interested him. Often he would place his canvas on the edge of a steep slope, and he would spend as much time as needed in order to bring the desired motif to life through his paintbrush. While at the Breton coast, Monet met his future biographer, Gustave Geffroy.

The island’s landscape is depicted with steep cliffs and rocky coasts, among them the rocks Port Domois and Port Coton, named ‘coton’ (cotton) after the white foam from the waves continuously crashing high against the rocks. Five paintings originate from Port Domois.

Besides painting the dangerous and sharp edges, Monet also painted the imposing heights, the sea, the tides crashing against the rock formations of the majestic coast, and the small ports and beaches of the island.

The exceptional rendition not only captures the inimitability of remarkable geology, but also of the tumultuousness of the Atlantic Ocean.

It is apparent in all the Belle-Île paintings that the highly-placed horizon leaves little room for the sky, and that the painter focused primarily on the fight between the water and the rocks. Thus, it is difficult to gauge the weather conditions of a painting, despite weather being a focal point in many of Monet’s works.

The paintings are colourful; the rocks, as much as the sea, are done in blue, green, and violet tones. The relatively dark colours generate a menacing atmosphere, an accurate rendition of the island’s character.

In comparison to the paintings The Rocks at Belle-Île (1886, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), The Port-Coton ‘Pyramids’ (1886, Gustave Rau Collection), and Rocks at Port-Coton, the Lion Rock, Belle-Île (vol. 1, p. 230), the painting Port-Domois, Belle-Île (vol. 1, p. 232) portrays a more tranquil image of the sea.

Daniel Wildenstein calls the Moscow painting Pyramids of Porte-Coton. Stormy Sea. Marine subjects play a prominent part in Monet’s œuvre.

The artist’s love of the sea was probably awakened when he lived in Le Havre, where he learned the rudiments of painting under Eugène Boudin.

Kolsaas Mountain, 1895. Oil on canvas, 65 x 92 cm. Private collection, US.

Valley of the Creuse (Gray Day), 1889.

Oil on canvas, 65.5 x 81.2 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Heavy Sea at Pourville, 1897. Oil on canvas, 73.5 x 101 cm.

The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo.

Monet painted seascapes all his life, but the best of them are those produced in the 1880s at Belle-Île and Étretat. In September and October 1886 the artist worked at picturesque Belle-Île and it was then, in all likelihood, that the Moscow canvas was painted. The gloom of the place invested the painting with a stern atmosphere; the colours are harsh and clashing patches of white, blue, green and brownish-violet, are applied in energetic, almost impasted strokes of varying sizes and shapes.

This dynamic handling evokes a sense of restless motion, the elements ever at work and the sea never the same. The mercurial sea is the keynote of the painting, everything else – the artist’s usual interest in the intricate play of reflected sunshine, the effects of light on colours, etc. – being less significant.

Monet was completely captivated by the stern romance of the sea and rocks. This spot was painted by Monet time and again, therefore versions of the motif are to be found in many collections in different parts of the world.

The same year, 1886, Monet portrayed the sea at Belle-Île in three other pictures, two of which are in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and one in a private collection in Copenhagen. Besides the Copenhagen painting, those depicting the cliffs of Belle-Île are also similar to the Moscow marine picture.

In Brittany he was moved by the region’s singularity and severity, writing to Durand-Ruel: “I am doing a lot of work; this place is very beautiful, but wild, yet for all that the sea is incomparable, surrounded by fantastic crags.”

As a result of his daily contact with Nature, Monet gained insight into her peculiarities, and he created landscapes in which concretely observed, unique features are combined with attempts at generalisation. One such work is the landscape The Rocks at Belle-Île (1886, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), in which he depicts the jagged, windswept crags of the Brittany coast, the white crests of the foaming water, and, beyond, the boundless sea, which seems almost to flow into the sky at the horizon.

This is indeed Brittany, but not only Brittany – it is the sea in general, its endlessness, its eternal battle with dry land. The painting is executed in varied, sensitive strokes, strictly following the form of the object portrayed – in this case, the cliffs. Monet set himself a rather different task in a landscape painted in that same year of 1886, Cliffs at Étretat (Pushkin Museum, Moscow). Here too, the viewer is presented with a wide expanse of sea, bounded to the left by the line of the shore which rises up into blue cliffs.