Water Lilies

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Nympheas, Musée Marmottan Monet, 1916
Nympheas, Musée Marmottan Monet, 1916
Main article: Claude Monet

Water Lilies (or Nympheas) is a series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionist Claude Monet (1840-1926). The paintings depict Monet's flower garden at Giverny and were the main focus of Monet's artistic production during the last thirty years of his life. Many of the works were painted as Monet suffered from cataracts.[1] In 1923, Monet had a lens removed from his right eye, correcting this but also allowing him to see ultraviolet light (which the lens usually blocks), and he began painting the water lilies in a more blue shade.

The paintings are on display at museums all over the world, including the Musée Marmottan-Monet in Paris,[2] the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York,[3] the Art Institute of Chicago,[4] the Saint Louis Art Museum,[5] the Carnegie Museum of Art, and the Portland Art Museum.[6] During the 1920s, the state of France built a pair of oval rooms at the Musée de l'Orangerie as a permanent home for eight water lily murals by Monet. The exhibit opened to the public on May 16, 1927, a few months after Monet's death.[1] Sixty water lily paintings from around the world were assembled for a special exhibition at the Musée de l'Orangerie in 1999.[7]

On June 19, 2007, one of Monet's water lily paintings sold for 18.5 million pounds at a Sotheby's auction in London.[8]

Monet's career long serial motif of producing and exhibiting a series of paintings related by subject and perspective began in 1889, with at least ten paintings done at the Valley of the Creuse, which were shown at the Galerie Georges Petit.[9] Among his other famous series are his Haystacks.

[edit] Gallery

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b "Monet, Claude." Grove Art Online.
  2. ^ Claude Monet paintings at the Marmottan
  3. ^ Water Lilies at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
  4. ^ Water Lilies at the Art Institute of Chicago
  5. ^ Water Lilies at the Saint Louis Art Museum,
  6. ^ Water Lilies at the Portland Art Museum
  7. ^ Susan Bell. "Paris sees Monet lilies in a new light." The Times. 8 May 1999.
  8. ^ Dalya Alberge. "Monet lilies make £18.5m but just miss world record." The Times. 20 June 2007.
  9. ^ Tucker, Paul Hayes, Monet in the '90s: The Series Paintings, 1989, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in association with Yale University Press , p.41.
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