The French Impressionists are quite possibly the most loved artists in the history of art. Their value increases with each decade especially since the best works are in the hands of museums. Claude Monet paintings are at the top of list for dealers and collectors. His water lily paintings are some of the most beautiful abstract works in the world.
The master of Giverney was convinced that the eye could look beyond surface appearance. That pictorial composition should be less about what one thinks one sees and more about the way light impacts any object. An object relays much more than the eye can see.
Monet lived most of his life in Giverney, France where he cultivated a massive garden complete with a Japanese bridge, a lily pond and innumerable flowers, bushes and trees. The house and garden remain intact today bringing visitors by the thousands each month. Everyone wants to behold the beauty of a genuine master of the art of painting. He was no slouch in the gardening department either.
Along with Paul Cezanne, the two Frenchmen are considered the fathers of abstraction. Both lived their life relatively quiet, away from the art metropolis that was Paris in the nineteenth century. Both had a profound vision with a stature that has only grown in the twentieth century.
Monet said the only thing that mattered to him was his paintings. Perhaps a few flowers, he admitted. He had no use for Parisian life, did not sit in cafes speculating on the art world and where it was going. He entertained visitors handsomely when they dropped in on him but lived a solitary life working. He was pursued by color and thought of little else.
The artist painted Rouen Cathedral in all the various lights, creating a constantly altering vision of it. In rendering this building under twenty different skies, he did nothing so much as show that to look at nature with accuracy requires a transformed perception. Each of the twenty patterns of light and color create an ordered universe. The cathedral remains a solid object; the atmosphere, the brightness of the sky determines the ever changing tableau. Through the eyes of a most exacting artist, we too are called upon to transcend ordinary vision.
Monet was able to grasp the fleeting and render the mystery of nature. He painted a heightened spectacle from a heightened awareness. He could paint the sun without a direct implication that the sun was in fact the subject. What was a haystack in a field, was in essence, a tonal exercise in light as it pitched itself to earth, changing by the minute, everything it touches.
While others rendered trees, fields, buildings and paths, Monet painted the air surrounding the scene. It frustrated him at times; this subject could never be completely captured. In this way he moved toward abstraction and away from exact realism. What he was attempting could probably not be mastered with paint on canvas. He did not care; it was the process that enthralled him.
Monet lived to the age of 86 and was nearly blind in his last years. He worked until the end. He never became bored with his garden though he did take a few trips to paint other scenes. After refreshing his vision, his garden was always there waiting for his renewed vision. His work never became a cliche or a formula. There is where the genius in Claude Monet paintings shows itself. To capture what is ephemeral, requires a touch of the miraculous. That rendering will never grow tedious.
The master of Giverney was convinced that the eye could look beyond surface appearance. That pictorial composition should be less about what one thinks one sees and more about the way light impacts any object. An object relays much more than the eye can see.
Monet lived most of his life in Giverney, France where he cultivated a massive garden complete with a Japanese bridge, a lily pond and innumerable flowers, bushes and trees. The house and garden remain intact today bringing visitors by the thousands each month. Everyone wants to behold the beauty of a genuine master of the art of painting. He was no slouch in the gardening department either.
Along with Paul Cezanne, the two Frenchmen are considered the fathers of abstraction. Both lived their life relatively quiet, away from the art metropolis that was Paris in the nineteenth century. Both had a profound vision with a stature that has only grown in the twentieth century.
Monet said the only thing that mattered to him was his paintings. Perhaps a few flowers, he admitted. He had no use for Parisian life, did not sit in cafes speculating on the art world and where it was going. He entertained visitors handsomely when they dropped in on him but lived a solitary life working. He was pursued by color and thought of little else.
The artist painted Rouen Cathedral in all the various lights, creating a constantly altering vision of it. In rendering this building under twenty different skies, he did nothing so much as show that to look at nature with accuracy requires a transformed perception. Each of the twenty patterns of light and color create an ordered universe. The cathedral remains a solid object; the atmosphere, the brightness of the sky determines the ever changing tableau. Through the eyes of a most exacting artist, we too are called upon to transcend ordinary vision.
Monet was able to grasp the fleeting and render the mystery of nature. He painted a heightened spectacle from a heightened awareness. He could paint the sun without a direct implication that the sun was in fact the subject. What was a haystack in a field, was in essence, a tonal exercise in light as it pitched itself to earth, changing by the minute, everything it touches.
While others rendered trees, fields, buildings and paths, Monet painted the air surrounding the scene. It frustrated him at times; this subject could never be completely captured. In this way he moved toward abstraction and away from exact realism. What he was attempting could probably not be mastered with paint on canvas. He did not care; it was the process that enthralled him.
Monet lived to the age of 86 and was nearly blind in his last years. He worked until the end. He never became bored with his garden though he did take a few trips to paint other scenes. After refreshing his vision, his garden was always there waiting for his renewed vision. His work never became a cliche or a formula. There is where the genius in Claude Monet paintings shows itself. To capture what is ephemeral, requires a touch of the miraculous. That rendering will never grow tedious.
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