Giverny opens on March 25th

March 15, 2016

water-garden-march

Although the water garden designed by Claude Monet still looks very peaceful, everybody is working hard at Giverny. The Fondation Monet (his home and gardens) as well as the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny reopen in ten days, on Friday, 25th March. It is earlier than normally, because Easter is especially early this year.

Just out of the Winter, the gardens are not overloaded with flowers, yet pleasant to walk around. They look fresh and shiny. The first signs of Spring can be noticed. Jonquils are already out, illuminating special spots with their bright yellow. I took the picture above this afternoon.

The Musée des Impressionnismes will display an exhibition of works by Gustave Caillebotte. This hugely talented impressionist was a keen horticulturist. His garden and rare flowers were among his favorite motifs.

 

American Impressionists Exhibit in Giverny

February 14, 2014

Mary Cassatt – Mother Holding a Child (around 1890)
Oil on canvas, 81 × 65,5 cm, Bilbao, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao
© Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao

The French museum dedicated to the different branches of impressionism, Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny, is housed in a building that was once the Museum of American Art Giverny.

This year, american impressionist paintings will be back in the galleries of the MDIG thanks to a new exhibit entitled “American Impressionism: A New Vision”.

From 28 March till 29 June 2014, 80 works by Cassatt, Robinson, Chase, Whistler, Sargent, Hassam or Tarbell will show how American painters adopted and adapted the new impressionist style by the end of the 19th century.

In a single word: it’s beautiful. I’m sure you will enjoy  it. 

2014 in Giverny

January 6, 2014

Happy new year, and best wishes for 2014!

Here is the stunning ‘black’ garden of the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny (Museum of Impressionisms).

The garden was created twenty years ago, this is why it indulges in this modern fashion for so called black flowers. Aren’t they amazing with their dark foliage or petals?

Of course black doesn’t exist for flowers, it’s always very dark red or purple, anyway unexpected hues for flowers.

Planting them together like here, and not just as accents, produces a very special effect, surprising and maybe a little bit disturbing, doesn’t it? I like the black garden, but I love the white one next to it!

The American impressionists will be back in 2014 in the gallery of the MDIG, that used to be the Museum of American Art Giverny, founded by Daniel Terra. The first exhibit will open on March 28, 2014 and is entitled “Impressionism and the Americans”. Featuring works by Cassatt, Whistler and Sargent, among many others, it will last until June 29, 2014. And for sure the impressionist painters used all the colors of the palette, not only black and white.

This exhibition will be followed by a second one focusing on Belgian artists, “Brussels, an Impressionist Capital” from July 11, 2014 to November 2, 2014.

 

Signac Exhibit at Giverny

January 6, 2013

“Signac, the Colors of Water” is the title of the next exhibition at the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny.

It will open on March 29, 2013 and display 120 works by the famous post-impressionist painter Paul Signac.

Signac is well-known for his pointillist, sometimes almost mosaic like paintings. He also loved watercolors for a quick sketch of a place, especially harbors.

Signac was a great admirer of Claude Monet. He stayed for the summer at Les Andelys, not far from Giverny, where Monet visited him and bought him a watercolor.

The Giverny exhibit includes a sumptuous view of the River Seine at Les Andelys belonging to Musée d’Orsay.

Joan Mitchell at Giverny

September 2, 2009

It sounds like the perfect transition for the new Museum of Impressionisms Giverny: after the first exhibition dedicated to Monet’s Nymphéas, that ended with resolutely modern late works, the next artist occupying the galleries of the museum is Joan Mitchell.

Although Mitchell rarely admitted Monet’s influence on her canvases, undoubtedly she put her feet in his footsteps. She lived in the same riverscape, the Seine Valley at Vétheuil. In this village where Monet had spent a couple of very hard years, painting relentlessly, she bought the house neighboring his, almost a century later, and just like Monet she admired the beautiful natural setting.

But instead of trying to recreate nature on the canvas, Mitchell, an abstract expressionist, preferred to concentrate on her own feelings. She shared with Monet an amazing energy, a fantastic talent as a colorist, a special love for oversized canvases, and more.

The exhibition is on display only a few miles away from Vetheuil until  31 October, 2009 at the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny.

Joan Mitchell, Great Valley number IX, oil on canvas

Success for the Monet Exhibition at Giverny

August 13, 2009

Over 100 000 visitors will have seen the beautiful exhibition of 28 paintings by Monet at the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny.

The exhibition started on May 1st ends on Saturday 15 August.

It will have met all the expectations by attracting crowds of Monet lovers in the village where the canvases, mostly featuring Nympheas, had been created.

The next exhibition opening on 23 August is dedicated to the oversized and colorful paintings of American artist Joan Mitchell.  Joan Mitchell, a master of expressionism, was inspired by Monet’s Nympheas. She lived for years in Vetheuil, her studio neighboring Monet’s house on the river side.

For the museum, it will be sort of a flash-back to its origins. Before becoming the Musee des Impressionnismes Giverny, it used to be the Musee d’Art Americain Giverny.

Monet, Bonnard and many more

March 28, 2009

A beautiful exhibition has just opened at Vernon’s museum. A must see if you come to Giverny!

It is entitled ”From Corot to Bonnard, masterpieces from the museums of Douai and Vernon” and features an impressive list of reknown artists such as Monet, Pissarro, Vuillard, Corot, Courbet, Bonnard and many more.

The visit leads you from the early stage of pre-impressionism to impressionism in its glory, followed by néo-impressionist works.  a feast for the eyes!

The exhibition is to be seen at Vernon’s museum for three months until June 28.

30 Monets at Giverny next year!

October 9, 2008

I am absolutely excited by the news I’ve just read in the local newspaper of Vernon: next year, the Fine Arts museum of Giverny (temporarily named Impressionist Museum, but its name may change) will start its new life with an incredible exhibition. The organisers plan to obtain 30 Monets! The theme will be, obviously enough, Monet’s gardens.

It seems too fantastic to be true, but I’m not dreaming. Imagine! The visitor will be able to see the paintings on the very place where they were created, to go from the canvases to the garden, from the garden to the canvases. A unique, unforgetable experience. It will be absolutely gorgeous. Visitors will leave Giverny their eyes full of beauty and harmony.

The new museum will open with this exceptional exhibition on May 1st, 2009, one month later than Monet’s home and gardens at Giverny, opening on April 1st, 2009. The paintings by the master of Impressionism will stay at Giverny through August 15th.

An exhibition of Joan Mitchell‘s paintings is scheduled from August 23rd through October 31st, 2009. The American artist Joan Mitchell has a direct connection with Monet: she bought and lived in the house neighbouring his former house at Vétheuil, 20 km from Giverny.

In the future the museum of Giverny will constitute its own permanent collection. It could be open year round. It’s hard to imagine better news, isn’t it?