For over six months, firstly with Bazille and then alone, Monet made the most of the charms of the Normandy coastline, producing a huge range of paintings from nature. He stayed in Honfleur, rising at dawn to seek out fresh subjects which he painted until evening. The Saint Siméon farm, represented on the left of the picture, is located on the road between Honfleur and Trouville. For several generations many painters (including Daubigny, Corot and Courbet) had spent time there, and so it became a recurring theme. In this case however, Monet is primarily interested in snow and its effects: ‘We noticed a foot-warmer, then an easel, and then a gentleman, wrapped tightly in three jackets, wearing gloves and a half-frozen expression: it was Monsieur Monet, studying the effects of snow.’ (Journal du Havre).During the winter of 1868-1869, the family was finally reunited as Camille and Jean joined Monet. Freed from financial problems, Claude took advantage of this peace of mind to depict Camille, one of her friends, and a neighbour in their house in Etretat. The painting’s subtitle (The Sisley family) has for a long time led us to believe that the painter’s friend – whom he met in Gleyre’s studio and who was present during their stays in Fontainebleau and Normandy – was also in Etretat at this time. Unfortunately the wonderfully calm period in Etretat was short-lived: because she was unhappy about her nephew’s relationship, which was now common knowledge in Normandy, his aunt Lecadre refused to pay him the pension that had got him out of trouble.Once he was settled in his second house in Argenteuil, Monet captured the memory of this happy period with his family. He then set out to represent both the gardens and the interior of the rooms, as in this view from the veranda. The painter tried above all to ‘study the air and light entering an interior’. He succeeds here mainly thanks to his meticulous composition: the symmetrical design of the parquet floor, and the line of vases and ceiling lights drawing the eye towards the light from the window at the far end of the room. The evenness and almost geometric symmetry of this interior’s composition is softened by the blue-toned atmosphere surrounding the silhouette of the child, Jean, and of his wife Camille seated in the background.
Bad weather days, precluding work in the open air, generated a significant output of fruit and flower paintings. Monet adapted his technique for this different theme: he observed the subject for a long period, and then scrupulously reproduced every detail. The decentring of the main motif is the only element of free expression in this traditional composition, giving it an original arrangement. The line of the table is reflected in the material covering the vase, and the floral motif on the wallpaper echoes the main bunch of flowers. Monets interest in flowers was really taking control in his life, a trend continuing through to the gardens at Giverny. At the time, he was growing chrysanthemums, a flower that was fashionable in the late 19th century, having been newly imported from the Far East at the end of the previous century.Shortly after his marriage, Monet left Bougival with his wife and son Jean to go back once again to the Normandy coast. At this point in early summer, Trouville was a key location in which to represent high society. This painting is the only one from the period that does not depict the pervasive frivolous pursuits. Carrying on the tradition of the previous year’s views of Honfleur, Monet focuses here on the vibrant activity of boats and fishermen on the sea rather than on elegant figures on the beach. Thus he represents the mouth of the river Touques which separates Trouville on the right bank from Deauville. Yet again he proved his talent as a painter of marine subjects, earning him his first glowing reviews at the Salon.Not long after completing his first works on this subject, Monet showed seven Gare Saint-Lazare paintings at the Third Impressionist exhibition in 1877. The reception given to them by most of the press was hostile. But commentators at the time highlighted a crucial aspect to these paintings: synaesthesia, or the association of several different types of sensory experience. They describe the paintings as giving the impression of several locomotives whistling simultaneously, or as reflecting how travellers experience the noise of engines at arrival or departure times. This blend of sensations also finds expression in the deafening fog of engine smoke that enshrouds the area around the station, revealing only the red signal.When bad weather precluded painting en plein air, Monet executed still lifes, especially bouquets of flowers. During the summer and autumn of 1869, he did several of them, including Fleurs et fruits while he was painting with Renoir, who depicted a similar bouquet in one of his pictures (Fleurs dans un vase). Renoir, who lived with his parents very near to Bougival, often came to paint with Monet on the banks of the Seine or in his studio. He also helped Claude by bringing some food when he once again experienced financial difficulties. During this period Monet even found himself forced to deposit a number of his canvases with Pissarro in Louveciennes, for fear of possible seizure.When Camille was pregnant with Jean, Monet, who was penniless, left her in Paris and returned to Le Havre to stay with his aunt. He then immersed himself frantically in his work. His relations with his family (especially his father) at that time seem to have improved perceptibly. The way Monet represents his father on this terrace suggests that the two men were on good terms: he is seated in the foreground beside the woman who would finance the early years of the painters career to a large extent, his aunt, Marie-Jeanne Lecadre. They are both looking at two other people, Monets cousin Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre and a man whose identity remains unknown. The flowers spreading out from this terrace combine with the sea, boats and sky, heralding the major works of Impressionism.Having left Bougival for Trouville, Claude Monet once more came across the famous seaside resort’s high society with its elegant ladies that had already been celebrated by his mentor, Eugène Boudin. But as in Sainte-Adresse three years earlier, he did not paint facing the sea, like Boudin, but instead used the seafront terrace for his painting’s composition. The row of facades held as much interest for him as people out walking or the sea itself. During this period of the Franco-Prussian War, Monet captures the image of a carefree world with elegant people under their parasols; he had returned to this world in order to take shelter from the siege of Paris and he stayed there until the autumn. Fearing that he would then be enlisted in the army, he left the society life of Normandy for England.
After Jean was born, Monet travelled to Paris on several occasions to visit Camille and his son. As winter approached, he moved back there for a short time. When the really cold weather set in, he went to Bougival, which had been transformed by the railway into a place where the Parisian middle classes went on trips, and would become one of the essential locations for Impressionist painters. In that winter of 1867 he painted what became a recurring subject for him: ice floes on the Seine. The river is depicted here flowing towards Rueil, with Ile de Croissy on the left. With this winter landscape, Monet rediscovered the joy he felt in conveying his impressions of snow. What is most striking here, however, is the way the landscape is depicted in blocks of solid colour.This portrait of one of the painters cousins, Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre, is an example of the motif of a woman with a parasol; it was executed in the garden of his Aunt Lecadres house at Sainte-Adresse. Monets aunt, and main source of support, was delighted at her nephews initial successes, as he had now sold his first canvases and obtained his first commission. The painter paid her a visit in the summer, giving him the chance to complete this canvas which illustrates the progress of his research into the relation of the figure to a landscape, the decorative exuberance of flowers and foliage, and how to preserve the radiance of a sun-drenched view. To achieve this, Monet gradually introduced a new approach: he abandoned large areas of solid colour in the manner of Courbet, evident in Le Déjeuner sur lHerbe, in order to move towards a progressively fragmented style.When Monet returned to the Paris region, he settled in Bougival, a place frequented by rowers and artists. He met up with Renoir there, and began to work collaboratively with him. The two painters devoted themselves to depicting a place called La Grenouillère, a floating inn by the banks of the Pot à Fleurs islet on the Seine. It was also known as ‘the Camembert’, and was overlooked by a small tree and connected to the embankments by footbridges. Monet’s style gained a hitherto unseen shimmering effect at that point, a stage on the journey to Impressionism. Central to the painting was the study of reflections, broken into wavelets caused by the bathers’ movements. A canvas on the same theme was rejected by the Salon in 1870, resulting in the resignations of Daubigny and Corot, who supported the master of ‘the school of nature for nature’s sake’.In 1863 Monet left Gleyres studio with his friend Bazille and embarked on a pilgrimage to the favourite location of previous landscape artists of the Barbizon school the Forest of Fontainebleau. There, he was able to rediscover the whole range of familiar themes that had been celebrated for several decades, including the Pavé de Chailly, a vast avenue of almost architectural proportions which acted as a gateway to the forest. He thus had the opportunity to work harder than ever at painting en plein air. According to his friend, Monet was at that point pretty good at landscapes, thanks to a well-established practice of painting from nature which he began in his native Normandy under his first master, Boudin. This painting, which still shows the influences of the Barbizon landscape artists and the realism of Courbet, was accepted by the Salon in 1866.
Following periods spent in England and Holland, Monet went back to France and tried to set up home outside Paris. He found what he wanted in a house in Argenteuil, near to the railway station and the Seine. The spring of 1872 brought magnificent blossoms to the orchards and gardens and so Monet spent much time in his own garden. There he painted some figures among the flowers: Camille on the left, along with two other individuals. Monet and Sisley also spent time together painting the features surrounding the house in Argenteuil. But the garden and its lilacs became, for Monet in particular, the means of treating a subject under various light conditions. Detailed precision thus gives way to the power of the imagination, and the blending of tones makes the figures and vegetation merge into one another.In the end the Déjeuner sur l’Herbe project proved too ambitious for Monet. The painting of spectacular proportions would never be completed, nor presented to the Salon as the artist had originally envisaged. He was encouraged, however, by all the young guard of contemporary painters, and he also received Courbet’s sound advice. Furthermore, he paid tribute to Courbet by representing him in the picture: he is the figure on the left in this fragment. The painting, pawned in Fontainebleau, would be reclaimed by the artist in 1884 in poor condition. Monet cut it into pieces, and hence the right section of the picture has disappeared. In this fragment, the central part of the original work, the tall male figure standing is recognizable as Bazille, but we do not know the identity of the female figures.Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l’Herbe, presented at the Salon des Refusés in 1863, caused a scandal. The presence of nude female figures alongside elegant gentlemen wounded the bourgeois sense of propriety at the time. It is however a traditional theme in the history of painting. Hence Monet used the theme to create a manifesto work fulfilling his ambition to paint life-size contemporary figures, a significant project similar in scale to the great academic works. He places smartly dressed figures in a clearing in Fontainebleau Forest, where they engage in the new fashion of having a picnic. This fragment, the left part of the original picture, refers back to a large extent to the study entitled Les Promeneurs, except in varying the young girl’s finery and her companion’s face.Exiled to London in 1871, Monet initially found it hard, until he was introduced by Daubigny to the great art collector Durand-Ruel. With Pissarro he discovered the English landscape masters (Constable, Turner, among others) and immersed himself in the distinctive atmosphere of London. He tried to make good use of his stay in London by working on recent studies he had been able to bring with him. But he also began some works on site, including this portrait of Camille, who joined him shortly after his arrival. This small interior painting, rather unusual in Monets career, verges on the genre scene. In it we see the first manifestations of his taste for things Japanese (the vase and fan on the mantelpiece), but above all, it is a charming image by the artist of his wife.The richly productive period of the previous year slowed down in 1873 when Monet once more experienced financial difficulties. He then shifted his attention away from the Seine to some extent, attaching special importance to flowers and gardens, particularly those at his own house in Argenteuil. He also depicted a sloping field, and a young woman with a parasol and child, who were none other than his wife and son, Camille and Jean. This remains one of Monet’s most famous works, especially as Monet actually seemed to accord it ‘manifesto’ status in presenting it to the first Impressionist Exhibition in 1874. Adopting small formats – which also had a commercial angle – allowed the artist to prove how delicate his painting could be, while maintaining the power and freedom of his larger canvases.The Gaudiberts were a family of merchants from Le Havre, collectors of art who were open to innovative trends. In 1868, Louis-Joachim Gaudibert commissioned Monet to do a portrait of him and then his wife, so that his parents would have a true image of their children. However, they described the portraits as ‘terribly vulgar’. The profile view of the model’s face, a pendant to the Camille à la robe verte portrait, focuses the eye on the treatment of the fabrics. The portrait then becomes primarily a pretext for depicting a bourgeois interior. The poor reception given to this portrait by the family – together with Monet’s relative failure at the International Maritime Exhibition in Le Havre – proves that his boldest work was not yet universally recognized, and marks a step towards the end of his official ambitions.On 27 April 1867 Monet approached the Louvre superintendant for permission to execute some views from the rooms in the museum. Once this was granted a few days later, he was able to begin three bird’s eye views looking towards the church of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois and the Seine. These dense, busy canvases reveal the painter’s particular liking for vividly portraying the play of light and shadow. The meticulous architectural representation was a way of conveying urban life, a theme that soon became part of the Impressionist world. The schematic silhouettes of figures, horses and cars seem to move or stand still at the dictate of the painter’s brush.Monet’s boat-studio allowed him to add to the views of the Seine around Argenteuil, which were entirely executed en plein air. The painter described the studio quite simply as ‘a barge with a cabin where I had just enough space to set up my easel’. He was thus able to paint this canvas which features in warm tones the small houses in front of the boat-builder’s yard at Petit-Gennevilliers. This double image, of real life and its reflection, shows a regular, concise system of brushstrokes. The background motifs, the road bridge and the house with dormer window, are superficially sketched. Monet came closer than ever to the traditional marine format with this canvas and other views of the Seine at Argenteuil.During his stay with his family in Normandy in 1868, Monet was free for a time from financial worries thanks to Monsieur Gaudiberts commissions. Thus he could be reunited with his wife and son, whom he had left in Paris for lack of money; he found accommodation for them on the route du Havre in Etretat. In this town he discovered the subject matter that had previously been celebrated by Delacroix, notably the Porte dAval, which can be seen in the background of this landscape. The following winter, the artist painted en plein air the numerous features of the shores around Etretat: pebble beaches, or cliffs with their arches hewn out of the rock. This led to Monet focusing his studies on the waves breaking on the shore. It is more than a mere landscape: the inclusion of silhouettes of people looking into the distance on the beach turns the picture into an account of daily life.The Gare Saint-Lazare, an archetypal symbol of modernity, dominated the painter’s output in 1877. At the beginning of that year Monet asked permission to paint inside the station. Because of the restrictions imposed by the need to keep traffic flowing, Monet did not have the luxury of completing his paintings on site. So first of all he executed study drawings for the paintings, which he then finished in his studio. Here he depicts the side of the station used for suburban lines, concentrating exclusively on the station and its engines. The human presence finds itself reduced to mere silhouettes. But more than anything, this sunny vision of the station’s interior allowed him to play with the smoke curls which progressively dissolve the contours of the buildings in the background.When he returned to Argenteuil at the end of 1876, all Monet could think of was his new subject: the Gare Saint-Lazare. So he decided to move nearby, to a place where he could both receive his clients and, more importantly, that would act as a base for his plan to paint around Saint-Lazare. In this work, he represents the part used for main line routes, notably the Normandy train, thus depicting a station that connected to most of the main Impressionist locations. The Gare Saint-Lazare then became a symbol of progress in the eyes of his contemporaries, and engines with tall funnels became the latest fashionable subject. On this point, Zola remarked: ‘That is where painting is today … Our artists have to find poetry in railway stations, as their fathers did in the forests and rivers.’The young Monets major painting campaign in 1864 involved returning to his roots. He went back to the Normandy subjects that he had known so well since childhood. During the second half of May, he painted alongside his studio friend Frédéric Bazille. After a period alone from mid-July, he was joined in Honfleur at the end of August by his first mentors, Eugène Boudin and Johan Barthold Jongkind. He worked frequently with the Dutch master at that time, developing his taste for landscapes painted from nature. In this way he completed several versions of the Hospice lighthouse near Honfleur. Before the end of the year, he returned to Paris with a rich harvest of studies, some of which were executed at Sainte-Adresse, though most of them were done in Honfleur.Among the tremendous output of his first year in Argenteuil, Monet painted some still lifes, mainly when bad weather stopped him from working outside. These show how the painter had developed, compared with his first attempts in this genre. He completed a more original study with a bold composition that shows an overall view of the table, brought to life by the folds in the damask tablecloth. His work focused on the effects of materials of the fruit, porcelain, and fabric taken together. The objects are ordered on the table in simple fashion. His interest in Japanese style is expressed in the accessories represented. These same qualities are found in another still life painted at this time: Le service à thé.Throughout his childhood and adolescence in the town of Le Havre, the young Monet spent many hours on the shore at Sainte-Adresse. This spot would later become the subject of his earliest works and of several series of canvases. More often than not, he depicted the beach towards the east, and the village church is visible on the left: this marked a break with the works of his master, Eugène Boudin, famous for his views facing the sea. In this Normandy series from 1867, comprising over twenty paintings, Monets brushstrokes are increasingly fragmented at certain points, signifying an important development compared to the works completed in Fontainebleau Forest two years earlier.Once he had set up on the beach at Trouville – the Mecca of high society in summer – Claude Monet was able to depict in full the frivolous nature of the world around him by creating a number of views of it. By executing views of the whole beach he could concentrate on the place where fashionable people paraded up and down. Occasionally the artist also did far more detailed views, often centred on female figures in close-up, which produced more original perspectives. For this painting, however, Monet positioned himself at right angles to the beach and laid out his canvas by juxtaposing the different spaces: the sea, the beach, the wooden walkway and stairs accessing the terrace, and finally the seafront’s grand facades lined up in a row.The riverbank at Petit-Gennevilliers gave Monet the opportunity to paint the road bridge over the Seine at Argenteuil on many occasions. Just like the brick and stone tollbooths, it was constructed from a variety of different materials (limestone rubble, bricks, cast iron, wood, reinforced concrete). The painter was thus able to play with the colours of the materials in this subject, the bridge at Argenteuil, which would come to typify Impressionist painting. But here it is the Seine that asserts itself, surrounded by the bridge and the house in the trees, formerly belonging to the ferryman and now converted into a guinguette (small restaurant). As well as being proof of Monet’s talent for composition, this canvas shows that the development of Impressionist technique and touch had reached a new stage.Shortly after settling in Argenteuil, Monet grew fond of painting as his subject the bridge carrying the road into the town centre. The bridge was still in the process of reconstruction at that point during the winter of 1871. It had in fact been burnt down during the war of 1870 and the Prussian occupation of Paris. It was rebuilt in the same style and using the same materials (wood and stone). Monet then painted the view of a bridge supported by scaffolding over the grey-blue waters of the Seine. This complex subject of interlinked beams seems to have made a great impression on him. He assigns great importance to it in this painting, also playing with its reflection on the river’s shimmering surface and setting it in stark opposition to the emptiness of the dark sky and the stillness of the water.From the train that took him to Argenteuil, Monet observed the comings and goings of the people whose job it was to carry coal to the Clichy gasworks at the foot of Pont d’Asnières. One day he stopped to capture on canvas the fascinating movement of the coalmen, keeping their balance as they made their way along narrow planks. This sudden incursion into the industrial era, coming together with the gardens and the world of the Argenteuil oarsmen, may be surprising. In fact, while Monet was not dissociating himself from realist themes, he seemed to deliberately gloss over some of the signs of industrialization, notably the factory chimneys around Argenteuil, which are absent from his paintings and yet present in Manet’s works. This unique work was, however, considered by its creator to be representative of his output, as he presented it at the Impressionist sale in 1875.As a result of the problems he experienced with large formats during his youth, especially those he encountered when trying to complete Déjeuner sur l’Herbe, Monet abandoned large-scale painting. So when he presented this Déjeuner to the second Impressionist exhibition in 1876, the painter referred to it not as a painting, but as a decorative panel, which meant it required less finish. In this work he expresses the delights of family life in the garden of Maison Aubry in Argenteuil. His son Jean is involved in boyish activity, while his wife Camille is gracefully sporting a large hat. Monet captures an everyday moment here: the table spread with tempting items has not been cleared, and a forgotten hat hangs from the branches of a tree while the little boy stays behind playing.For Monet, painting in the open air was even more pleasant, perhaps, in winter than in summer. For then he could stick to what in his view was a key theme: the effects of snow. In fact with this picture he looked back to the Honfleur snowscapes executed two years previously. This canvas, intended for the 1869 Salon, was rejected. Monet was probably paying the price of being the titular head of the new painting group painters whom Gérôme called a bunch of lunatics. Their success at the exhibition in Latouches shop (in which Monet took part) caused sensation. The artist then reviewed his projects, and sought to move closer to the capital. In doing so he would be able to paint in a convenient location, and at the same time keep an eye on what was happening in Paris.In mid-October 1864, Monet spent a few days with his family in Sainte-Adresse to appease them following their displeasure at his long absence. He then executed some studies painted near Cap de la Hève, once again demonstrating his taste for the coastal landscapes of Normandy. But a heated scene erupted: asked to leave and not to come back in a hurry, Monet was faced with the threat of having his allowance cut off. The incident left him into a very difficult position, considering the debts he had incurred during his stay in Honfleur. Yet he was still obsessed with his aim of exhibiting in the 1865 Salon. So he worked on repeating his best studies, with variations, including this view of Sainte-Adresse. At the Salon, Monet was to assert his independence by refusing to seek a reference from any of the masters.Monet faithfully depicted the Argenteuil countryside, presenting a truly panoramic view: the promenade lined with plane trees, the towpath, and the gently sloping riverbank, where people strolling by paused, while others watched the oarsmen. The hot bathhouse moored to the bank can be discerned, along with the washing boats in the background. The painter allows himself a few liberties with real life, however, in his treatment of the road bridge (he only keeps five of the seven arches) and the tollbooth (taller than life-size). This particularly accomplished work was the beginning of a rich series of paintings on the theme of the Seine at Argenteuil.After he had returned from the municipal exhibition in Rouen, and until the end of 1872, the most important part of Monet’s artistic output took place in Argenteuil. Most of his work was done on the right bank of the Seine, the Argenteuil side, painted facing the setting sun beyond the trees of the promenade. The road and rail bridges, the Seine, the sky of Ile-de-France, and the promenade’s trees would become the key subjects in Monet’s work in Argenteuil, forming the most distinctive motifs of this highpoint of Impressionist painting. Here, the painter focuses his attention on the physical features, especially the promenade and the river, but typically at the same time he suggests a human presence through small details.The studio in Maison Aubry had become too cramped for Monet by the end of 1874 and he sought larger accommodation. He therefore rented another detached house from a carpenter in Argenteuil – a pink house with green shutters opposite Argenteuil station, where he stayed for four years. This took him closer to one of his favourite subjects – the railway. This theme actually appeared at a very early stage in Monet’s work (Train dans la campagne, 1870) and it was to recur more frequently later, especially in the series focused on Gare Saint-Lazare. Monet plays on the monumental character of industrial architecture, as well as on the curls of smoke from the locomotive crossing the bridge.Two constructions span the Seine at Argenteuil: a toll road bridge and, 500 metres upstream, a railway bridge. Both of them were destroyed in 1870, but their rapid reconstruction allowed Monet to make it a subject for his paintings. So he painted each of them: the railway bridge is sometimes barely perceptible between the arches of the road bridge, and sometimes, as is the case here, is treated in its own right, highlighting the monumental nature of industrial architecture. It was during this period that the Impressionist painters’ group was formed officially in the first Impressionist exhibition, which opened in Nadar’s studio on 15 April 1874. The painters were then in frequent contact with each other. Most notably, Manet and Renoir came to Argenteuil to paint with Monet.In Argenteuil, Monet painted the places which were among the key images of Impressionism: the town’s bridges and the Seine basin. Sometimes though, the painter left the river in order to represent other subjects in the town itself: the houses around his home, the town’s main streets, and also the station at Argenteuil with the Sannois hills in the landscape’s background. Here Monet was able to gain access to railway engines with tall funnels. This painting, prefiguring the views of the Gare Saint-Lazare he would paint five years later, allowed him to play with the movement created by the wind as it blew the smoke curls: the white plume is then contrasted with the blackness of the locomotives waiting in the station.After settling in Argenteuil, Monet set out to paint the surrounding countryside, but occasionally retreated to his home where he found familiar subjects. This portrait, which is apparently of Camille wearing a red cape, is a case in point. The artist finds perfect harmony in his view of the subject, the spontaneous expression of the female figure, and the simplicity of effects applied. This highly original painting allowed him to prove his talent for playing with the light and transparency of the glass panes and curtains. He went for a composition that was subtly decentred, disrupting the models solemnity. In its portrayal of the contemporary middle classes, this female portrait is in the tradition of Femmes aux jardins. For a long time, Monet held on to this painting of his wife: he kept the canvas until 1920.Back in Paris in early 1878 after the birth of his son Michel, Monet was concerned about the increasingly fragile state of Camille’s health. All the same, he went off in search of new subjects in Paris. The national holiday on 30 June 1878, organized to celebrate the success of the Exposition Universelle, gave him the opportunity to paint the capital awash with colour and once more flying the tricolour flag. As Monet explained, ‘I loved flags. On the first national holiday on 30 June, I was walking along Rue Montorgueil with the tools of my trade; the street was decked with flags and crowded with people; I spotted a balcony, so I went up and asked permission to paint there, which was granted. Then I came back down again, incognito!’ The resulting hastily executed canvas shows the seductive effect for Monet of flags fluttering in the wind.Based in Bougival from late 1869, Monet painted several views from Ile de Croissy, a key location for the future Impressionist movement. Here, he represents the Seine looking downstream, with the bridge at Bougival in the background. The horizon is also broken up by the Marly aqueduct which supplied water to the Château de Versailles. This depiction of evening, animated only by a single boat, stands in sharp contrast to other paintings of the location which feature the lively presence of oarsmen. Having become established in Bougival, the following year he married Camille-Léonie Doncieux, with Gustave Courbet and two of his first collectors as witnesses. His family, on the other hand, disapproved of this union and did not attend: Aunt Lecadre died a few days later.When he was staying in Trouville during the autumn of 1870, Monet decided to go to England, possibly to avoid being called up by the army. While there, he painted this view of the Thames and Parliament from Victoria Quay. The compositional scheme of this canvas is based predominantly on its network of horizontal and vertical lines, with the monuments architecture echoing the boats on the river. Monet illustrates the London atmosphere by painting a picture that is dominated by grey tones, attenuated only by a pink light appearing on the horizon. It was in London that Daubigny introduced Monet to the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel, who was there to open a gallery in 1870 and would become the artists most faithful sponsor.Once he was established in Argenteuil, Paris became a more or less permanent pied-à-terre for Monet. He needed to be there in order to keep abreast of what was happening in the art world and moreover it seems that the painter gradually began to turn away from the suburbs after 1876, rediscovering the capital as a way of breaking out of his lethargy. He met one of Paul Cézanne’s collectors, Victor Choquet, whose flat in the Rue de Rivoli provided him with views of the Tuileries which he then painted. In L’uvre, Emile Zola describes a painting by Claude Lantier (his artist character) as follows : ‘In the background, the Tuileries faded in a dense golden cloud, the cobblestones oozed blood, and passers-by were merely hinted at, dark spots consumed by the excessive glare.’Monet presents us with a striking image in this work: a low-angle composition with the figure of his wife Camille standing out boldly against the sky. She is captured apparently at the moment when she becomes aware of the painters presence and turns towards him. A sense of movement is produced by the grey veil covering part of her face and by the folds of her dress. This shimmering figure thus forms a stark contrast to the far more static figure of their son Jean in the background. The two figures seem almost like strangers to each other. This canvas, presented to the Second Impressionist Exhibition, employs a recurrent motif in Monets work a woman with a parasol.‘Like everyone else at that time, I started working with studies from nature and painted the complete work in my studio.’ This is Monet’s description of the way in which he carried out the Déjeuner sur l’Herbe project. He could not begin his manifesto work en plein air due to the considerable size he had in mind for it. Les Promeneurs is the only one of these preliminary studies painted from nature in Chailly during the summer of 1865 that has been preserved. Monet planned to use it for the left section of the final picture. He turned to his friends and family for models, although rain seriously disrupted the work: Bazille posed for the figure on the left at the end of August, and the female figure was apparently Camille, Monet’s future wife.
When the weather improved, Monet settled down to paint on the Ile de Croissy near Bougival. While there, he depicted the areas around Rueil and Chatou, now affected by the arrival of the Paris to Saint-Germain-en-Laye railway line; a train with its two-tier carriages can be seen in the background of the painting. This was the first occurrence of this theme in Monet’s works, heralding a subject that would be close to his heart for the rest of his career. The train only appears here in the distance behind an English-style landscaped park, which is dotted with small middle-class figures. Yet the treatment of locomotive smoke is already very much in evidence. This painting marks the end of a particularly rich creative period around Bougival.
