by Ariane ~ July 21, 2008
When Claude Monet was 70 he conceived a crazy project: huge panels featuring his pond to be glued on the walls of a big oval room.
Somebody standing in the middle of this room would be surrounded by his relaxing work.
It took him ten years to achieve his aim. He had to build a new studio for these over-sized paintings, he became almost blind because of cataract, but he managed to paint 91meter long canvases (almost 300 feet long). They are two meter high, as high as Monet could paint when he stood. Two rooms were eventually necessary to accommodate them.
The Grandes Decorations can be seen in l’Orangerie Museum in Paris on the Place de la Concorde, opposite to Musée d’Orsay. They won’t travel ever, they cannot be dismounted. The museum has just been renovated for six years and these extremely valuable paintings didn’t move while the ceiling of their rooms were opened and transformed.
A last amazing detail about these amazing murals: Monet donated them to the French state to celebrate the victory of 1918. He donated a ten year work!
by Ariane ~ July 16, 2008
At Monet’s time, only white water lilies grew wild in France.
They were hardy flowers, able to stand cold and frost, whereas pink or yellow water lilies were of exotic origin and needed a warm greenhouse to spend the winter.
When Monet created his water garden at Giverny and imagined a pond with floating islands of colorful nympheas, these flowers where very modern.
By the end of the nineteen century a man called Bory Latour-Marliac had the idea of cross fertilizing hardy white water lilies with exotic ones. He was successful and obtained a full palette of hardy waterlilies. In 1889, the year of the Eiffel tower, Latour-Marliac exhibited his new creations at the Universal Exhibition in Paris, where Monet saw them. Four years before he had his pond dug he conceived the idea of it by seeing the beautiful water flowers.
Would Latour-Marliac not have created his flowers, Monet would probably not have painted his Nympheas masterpieces.
by Ariane ~ July 12, 2008
In Monet’s garden at Giverny, yellow and red flowers unite their flame-like radiant colors.
This effect is obtained by mixing yellow flowers, especially liliums and spotted-loosestrifes with delicate red crocosmias.
Croscosmias leaves have also translucent qualities enhanced by the morning sunshine.
by Ariane ~ July 8, 2008
When he didn’t paint, Monet liked to be well dressed.
Look at him standing in the main alley of his garden at Giverny. Monet did his best to look elegant. I am not sure he always achieved this target, for he had a funny and complicated way of dressing. He liked round shaped jackets, as a result he looked a bit like a big insect.
Anyway, Monet went to the best tailors in Paris and ordered expensive suits, even when he was short of money. He just didn’t pay for the bills… I was told the English aristocrats didn’t either in the 19th century. Obviously, Monet’s tailors were not enthralled and the painter would get into troubles, of course.
by Ariane ~ June 29, 2008
In his water garden at Giverny, Claude Monet had a dock adornated by arches of climbing roses.
It is especially beautiful in late June when the roses are in blossom, adding their pink to the greens of the foliages.
At Monet’s time there was a boat anchored at the dock. It was used mainly by the gardener devoted to the water garden.
This gardener had a special job: every morning he had to wash the water lilies. The road nearby made them dusty, Monet who wanted to paint them, wanted them to be clean.
The gardener used to get up very early in the morning, before the master would come, and tour the pond in the boat to push the flowers under the surface with the row to clean them.
Water lily washer, isn’t it a poetic job?
by Ariane ~ June 27, 2008
Giverny lies in the Seine Valley. In geological times the river dug its valley in the tender limestone.
Now there are cliffs or steep hills on both sides of the river. When the hill faces north, it is covered by woods. When it is well oriented it used to be cultivated when Monet lived in Giverny, 100 years ago.
There were vineyards on the hills. Normandy is not a good place where to grow grapes, but our ancestors tried and made a wine which ranged between ‘almost not drinkable’ generally to ‘not too bad’ the best years.
It is not possible to judge, for it is not possible to taste it anymore. Even the eldest inhabitants of Giverny won’t tell, the vineyards disappeared before World War One. I don’t think anybody really regrets them.
by Ariane ~ June 22, 2008
Sometimes when I watch flowers in Claude Monet’s gardens at Giverny, I wonder what it can be like to be an ant.
It must be incredible to be able to walk in or on a flower, among these petals that look like candy.
Does an ant feel vertigo?
At the same time distances are so, so long when you are so tiny. And so many decisions have to be made all the time. Will this ant go on this way or go back to find another path?
by Ariane ~ June 18, 2008
Only three miles from Giverny, the town of Vernon is worth a visit.
This tower is the keep of the castle built in the 12th century by the French king Philip Augustus.
At this time Vernon was on the border with the kingdom of England. Strongholds were built on each side of the border materialised by a stream called the Epte.
The keep of Vernon was used during the 19th Century to store the town archives.
Now it is just a landmark of the town. It dominates a charming public garden called ‘jardin des Arts’, garden of the arts.
by Ariane ~ June 15, 2008
The island bed located just under Monet’s windows at Giverny has a special meaning.
It doesn’t obey the rules Monet applied elsewhere in the garden to compose the flower beds. In fact, Monet didn’t create this one. It is a copy of an island bed he had seen and liked at his aunt Jeanne Lecadre.
Claude Monet painted the garden of his aunt several times when he was 26. On the canvases the same roses in trees and pink geraniums surrounded by dianthus can be seen, but they were painted at his aunt in Sainte Adresse, not in Giverny.
Monet copied this island bed to remember his youth and his aunt. She meant a lot to him, she encouraged him to become a painter.
by Ariane ~ June 11, 2008
Claude Monet was influenced by his extensive collection of Japanese woodblocks when he created his water garden.
He liked all the bamboos, wisterias, water lilies or peonies he could see on them and wanted these exotic plants in his garden.
He also loved the curved bridges which are so common on Japanese prints.
But although Monet knew pretty well the lay out of a Japanese garden thanks to his readings and to his neighbour American painter Lilla Cabbott Perry who had lived in Tokyo, he took poetic license.
He didn’t intend to create a true Japanese garden. His bridges are much less bent than authentic ones, and they are green. In a true Japanese garden, they should be red.
by Ariane ~ June 10, 2008
Water lilies have their own dreams: being as light as soap bubbles and float in the air…
Monet was fascinated by the reflection of the sky and the clouds.
When the water is absolutely still the surface of his lake is a perfect mirror.
The Nympheas seem to hang in the blue sky.
by Ariane ~ June 9, 2008
Claude Monet liked poppies, red poppies in the fields and pink poppies in his garden at Giverny.
His painting of his wife and son walking in a meadow full of poppies is one of the most famous of musée d’Orsay in Paris.
All the poppies are currently in bloom in his flower garden at Giverny, tiny or enormous, scarlet or pink, orange, yellow, some one color, some two. The pink and purple poppies are spectacular.
Monet preferred one color flowers but he also used two color flowers just as he could take two colors with his brush on his palette and put them in one gesture on the canvas.
by Ariane ~ June 8, 2008
Monet’s home in Giverny has three entrances, each one dedicated to a particular use.
This is typical for the time when the house was built, in the 19th century.
One door was devoted to Monet’s own use. It leads directly to his first studio and to the stairs to his bedroom. It enabled Monet to go in and out without disturbing the family life – he liked to get up exceedingly early in the morning – or perhaps without being disturbed by the family life – there were eight children in the family. This entrance could be called the professional one.
There was of course a main entrance for family members and guests.
The third one was a domestic entrance leading directly to the kitchen.
by Ariane ~ June 6, 2008
Monet’s garden at Giverny is full of roses.
It is not a proper rose garden, for there are also many other sorts of flowers, but nonetheless it is gorgeous in May and June when the roses are in bloom.
They are everywhere, weeping from the umbrella like structures, climbing on trellises, on fences, on trees, on the facade of the house, wrapped around tripods, in bunches, or among peonies and sweet rocket in the mixed borders…
All sorts of colors can be seen, pale cream, pure white, soft yellow, many pinks, red, orange… Not all of them are simple roses but many are scented. Light and delight.
by Ariane ~ June 5, 2008
Monet was keen on painting through the weeping willow. It was difficult, and he liked the challenge.
There was the vertical axis of the branches and the horizontal axis of the floating water lilies.
In addition, the reflection of the sky looks like a hole in the water.
And Monet could even see the stems of the flowers under the surface.
When he painted here, he had to mix all the different plans to put them on the two dimensional canvas.
