Haystacks (Monet series)

Wheatstacks (End of Summer)
Artist Claude Monet
Year 1890-91
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions 60 cm × 100 cm ( 23 5⁄8 in ×  39 3⁄8 in)
Location Art Institute of Chicago

Haystacks is the common English title for a series of impressionist paintings by Claude Monet. The primary subjects of all of the paintings in the series are stacks of wheat [or possibly barley or oats: the original French title is Les Meules à Giverny simply meaning The Stacks at Giverny] in the field after the harvest season. The title refers primarily to a twenty-five canvas series (Wildenstein Index Number 1266-1290) begun in the end of summer of 1890 and continued through the following spring, using that year's harvest. Some use a broader definition of the title to refer to other paintings by Monet with this same theme. The series is known for its thematic use of repetition to show differences in perception of light across various times of day, seasons, and types of weather. The subjects were painted in fields near Monet's home and gardens in Giverny, France.

The series is among Monet's most notable works. Although the largest collections of Monet's work is held in Paris at the Musée d'Orsay and Musée Marmottan Monet, other notable Monet collections are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston,[1][2] the Metropolitan Museum and Museum of Modern Art in New York, and at the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo.[3] Six of the twenty-five Haystacks pieces in this series are currently housed at the Art Institute of Chicago.[4] Other museums that hold parts of this series in their collection include: the Getty Center in Los Angeles,[5] the Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, Connecticut (which also has one of five from the earlier 1888-9 harvest),[6] the National Gallery of Scotland,[7] the Minneapolis Institute of Arts,[8] Kunsthaus Zürich, and the Shelburne Museum, Vermont.[9] Several private collections also hold Haystacks paintings.

Monet background

Monet settled in Giverny in 1883. Most of his paintings from 1883 until his death 40 years later were of scenes within 3 kilometres (2 mi) of his home. Indeed, the stacks themselves were situated just outside his door.[10] He was intensely aware of and fascinated by the visual nuances of the region’s landscape and the variation in the seasons.

Monet had already painted the same subject in different moods. However, as he matured as a painter, his depictions of atmospheric influences were increasingly concerned not only with specific effects but with overall color harmonies that allowed for an autonomous use of rich color.[11] The conventional wisdom was that the compact, solid stacks were both a simple subject and an unimaginative one. However, contemporary writers and friends of the artist noted that Monet's subject matter was always carefully chosen, the product of careful thought and analysis.[12] Monet undertook a study of capturing their vibrance under direct light and juxtaposing the same subject from the same view in more muted atmospheric conditions. It was not unusual for Monet to alter the canvases back in his studio, in search of harmonious transitions within the series.[13]

Series background

The stacks depicted in the series are commonly referred to in English as hay, wheat or grain-stacks though in reality they stored sheafs of grain for bread - so wheat [or possibly barley or oats] - and certainly not hay, an animal food. The 10-to-20-foot (3.0 to 6.1 m) stacks were a way of keeping the sheafs dry until the grain could be separated from the stalks by threshing.[14] The local method of storing and drying unthreshed-grains was to use wheat-straw, or sometimes hay, as a thatched 'roof' for the stack, shielding the wheat, barley or oats from the elements until they could be threshed. The threshing machines then traveled from village to village. Thus, although the grain was harvested in July it often took until March for all the farms to be reached by the machines. Grain storage-stacks like these became common throughout Europe in the 19th century and survived until the inception of combine harvesters. Although the shapes of stacks were regional, in Normandy, where Giverny is situated, it was common for them to be round with quite steeply-pitched thatched 'roofs' .

Monet noticed the changing light on his local stacks. He requested that his stepdaughter Blanche Hoschedé bring him two canvases. He believed that one canvas for overcast weather and one for sunny weather would be sufficient.[15] However, he realized he could not demonstrate the several distinct impressions on one or two canvases. As a result, his willing helper was quickly carting as many canvases as a wheelbarrow could hold.[16] His daily routine involved carting paints, easels, and many unfinished canvases and working on whichever canvas most closely resembled the scene of the moment as conditions fluctuated. Although he began painting realistic depictions en plein air, he eventually revised initial effects in a studio to both generate contrast and preserve the harmony within the series.[17]

Monet produced numerous Haystacks paintings. His earlier landscapes (Wildenstein Index Number 900-995, 1073) had included stacks in an ancillary manner. Monet had also produced five paintings (Wildenstein Index Numbers 1213-1217) with stacks as the primary subject during the 1888 harvest.[18] The general consensus is that only the canvases produced using the 1890 harvest (Wildenstein Index Number 1266-1290) comprise the Haystacks series proper. However, some include several additional paintings when referencing this series. For example, Hill-Stead Museum discusses their two stack paintings even though one is from the 1890 harvest and the other is from the 1888 harvest.[6]

Monet's Haystacks series is one of his earliest to rely on thematic repetition to illustrate nuances in his perception across natural variations such as times of day, seasons, and types of weather. For Monet, the concept of producing and exhibiting a series of paintings related by subject and vantage point began in 1889, with at least ten paintings done at the Valley of the Creuse, and subsequently shown at the Galerie Georges Petit.[19] This interest in the serial motif would continue for the rest of his career.

Thematic issues

Although the mundane subject was constant throughout this series, the underlying theme may be seen as the transience of light. This concept enabled him to use repetition to show nuances of perception as seasons, time of day, and weather changes. The constant subject provided the basis from which comparisons could be made in changes of light across this nuanced series.[20] The first paintings in the series were started in late September or early October 1890, and he continued producing these paintings for about seven months. These paintings made Monet the first painter to paint such a large quantity of pictures of the same subject matter differentiated by light, weather, atmosphere and perspective.[17]

Beginning in the 1880s and 1890s, Monet focused on Haystacks and a number of other subjects (other series included the Mornings on the Seine, Poplars, Rouen Cathedral, the Houses of Parliament, and the Water Lilies, among others). In order to work on many paintings virtually simultaneously, he would awake before dawn so as to begin at the earliest time of day:

As the morning progressed and the light changed he would switch to sequentially later canvas settings, sometimes working on as many as ten or twelve paintings a day, each one depicting a slightly different aspect of light.[22] The process would be repeated over the course of days, weeks, or months, depending on the weather and the progress of the paintings until they were completed. As the seasons changed the process was renewed.

Certain effects of light only last for a few minutes, thus the canvases documenting such ephemera received attention for no more than a few minutes a day.[23] Further complicating matters, the light of subsequent sunrises, for example, could alter substantially and would require separate canvases within the series.[24] Subsequently, different hues are evident in each painting, and in each work, color is used to describe not only direct but reflected light. At differing times of day and in various seasons stacks absorb the light from diverse parts of the color spectrum. As a result, the residual light that is reflected off of the stacks is seen as ever-changing, and manifests in distinctive coloring.[25]

Many notable painters have been influenced by this particular series including Les Fauves, Derain, and Vlaminck.[26] Kandinsky's memoirs refer to the series: “What suddenly became clear to me was the unsuspected power of the palette, which I had not understood before and which surpassed my wildest dreams.”[27]

Grainstacks, Snow Effect, 1890-91, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, Scotland.

The Haystacks series was a financial success.[28] Fifteen of these were exhibited by Durand-Ruel in May 1891, and every painting sold within days.[28] The exhibit met with great public acclaim. Octave Mirbeau described Monet's daring series as representing "what lies beyond progress itself." Others described the stacks as "faces of the landscape" - they represented the countryside as a retreat from daily problems and home for contentment with nature. Camille Pissarro said: "These canvases breathe contentment."[14] Most of the paintings sold immediately for as much as 1,000 francs.[29] Additionally, Monet’s prices, in general, began to rise steeply. As a result, he was able to buy outright the house and grounds at Giverny and to start constructing a waterlily pond. After years of mere subsistence living, he was able to enjoy success.

The series demonstrates his intense study of light and atmospheric conditions and Monet was a perfectionist in his renderings. Monet destroyed more than one series of paintings that he found wanting.[30] However, this series escaped his own harsh self-criticism and destruction.

1888-1889 paintings

From the 1888 harvest, Monet produced three canvases featuring two stacks each (Wildenstein #'s 1213-5) against the backdrop of hills along the left bank of the Seine and a few Giverny houses to the right. Then, he turned to his left to capture two scenes (1216-7) in which the hills are shrouded by a line of poplars.[31]

1890-1891 series

Notes

  1. ↑ "Collection Search Results: Grainstack (Snow Effect)". Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 2007. Retrieved July 3, 2007.
  2. ↑ "Collection Search Results: Grainstack (Sunset)". Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. 2007. Retrieved July 3, 2007.
  3. ↑ "Country-by-Country List of Museums Holding Originals (Monet)". artofmonet.com. Retrieved October 9, 2007.
  4. ↑ Jill Shaw (2014). "Stacks of Wheat, 1890/91". In Groom, Gloria; Shaw, Jill. Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago. Art Institute of Chicago. Retrieved 24 February 2017.
  5. ↑ "Explore Art: Artists; Claude Monet; Wheatstacks, Snow Effect, Morning". The Getty Center, Los Angeles. 2010. Retrieved January 26, 2010.
  6. 1 2 "Highlights of the Collection (Paintings:Monet)". Hill-Stead Museum. Retrieved July 17, 2007.
  7. ↑ "Collection M: Claude Monet". Retrieved July 3, 2007.
  8. ↑ "Collections > Explore the Collection (Grainstack, Sun in the Mist)". The Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Retrieved July 2, 2007.
  9. ↑ "Collections: Impressionist Paintings (Image 02)". Shelburne Museum. 2005. Archived from the original on August 22, 2007. Retrieved July 2, 2007.
  10. ↑ Tucker, p.87.
  11. ↑ House, page 127.
  12. ↑ Tucker, p.33.
  13. ↑ "It is worth remembering that the stacks were literally at his doorstep, as photographs of the area make clear Tucker, Paul Hayes (1989). Monet in the '90s: The Series Paintings. Museum of Fine Arts. p. 95. ISBN 9780300049138.
  14. 1 2 Lemonedes, p. 143.
  15. ↑ Kelder, p.183.
  16. ↑ The veracity of this story has been doubted: '"When I began I was like the others; I believed that two canvases would suffice, one for gray weather and one for sun! At the time I was painting some stacks....One day I saw that my light had changed. I said to my stepdaughter: 'Go to the house, if you don't mind, and bring me another canvas!'" And so Monet worked on the story: another canvas! Another! The fact is that ever since he had started to paint he had had the habit of working from the same motif under different conditions....And yet there is something new here, a difference of emphasis.' Forge and Gordon, p. 158.
  17. 1 2 Lemonedes, p. 139.
  18. ↑ Tucker, p.31.
  19. ↑ Tucker, p.41.
  20. ↑ So as to return to a painting at the correct moment, "on occasion Monet took the precaution of writing the time of day on the back of his canvases". House, p.143.
  21. ↑ House, p.143
  22. ↑ In a letter to Alice Monet dated March 29, 1893, Monet wrote of having worked on fourteen paintings in one day at Rouen. House, p.144.
  23. ↑ "In 1883 Jules Laforgue had spoken of a quarter hour as the natural time span for an Impressionist painting, while Monet himself mentioned seven minutes as the limit for one of his Poplar series...and in 1918 talked of effects which lasted 'sometimes three or four minutes at the most'". House, p.142.
  24. ↑ "The constantly varying weather, rather than any idea of a final pictorial ensemble, remained his initial reason for endlessly multiplying his canvases." House, page 204.
  25. ↑ "In Grain Stack at Sunset intense brick reds give the shadowed side of the stack an incandescent core, while the light of the sunset haloes the stack with vermilion and yellow, and scatters the lit parts of the field with particles of pink, orange, and mauve." House, page 128.
  26. ↑ "Monet Haystacks". Impressionist Art Gallery. 2006. Retrieved October 1, 2007.
  27. ↑ Excerpts from Kandinsky's memoirs, page 53. CDlib.org Retrieved May 30, 2007.
  28. 1 2 Tucker, p.77.
  29. ↑ "...before the show even opened, Durand-Ruel purchased eight of the fifteen Grainstacks that the artist would exhibit. In the meantime, Monet had been able to sell two others that he would include in the exhibition...That meant that of the fifteen stacks that went on view in May 1891, ten were already spoken for, leaving only five for anyone who might have been interested." Tucker, p.98.
  30. ↑ "Many accounts speak of Monet destroying incomplete abortive paintings; with the London series and the Water Lilies of 1903-1909 the destructions seem to have been very extensive. In 1907, when deferring his exhibition of Water Lilies, he told Durand-Ruel that he had destroyed 'at least thirty of them, to my great satisfaction'." House, page 159.
  31. ↑ Forge, Andrew, and Gordon, Robert, Monet, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1989, pp. 156-163.

References

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