Monet

Monet was one of that celebrated group of artists known as the Impressionists.  He was born in 1840 (the year the Treaty of Waitangi was signed) and died in 1926 and the ripe old age then of 86.

The first image in this post is an earlier Monet work.  I love the colours.  As he aged his sight deteriorated and this might be part of the explanation for the increasingly wild depictions, for instance in the famous series of water lily paintings.  You don't really get any idea of the scale of these paintings until you see some in the flesh, so to speak.  My first time was at MOMA in New York – the paintings were so huge that they were very hard to take in.

Monet used his wife Camille as a model many many times.  This is her in a green dress.  He is said to have painted this in only 4 days.

Monet even painted her on her deathbed – after she had just died.  This caused his wife's family great annoyance and distress.  But maybe it was just his way of coping – even though a pretty gruesome way.  Afterwards he kept the painting in his bedroom.  What a thing to see every day!

Later on, Monet concentrated on creating the beautiful garden at Giverny – which ended up being so large it took 7 gardeners to manage it.  It was Giverny that led to the water lily paintings and also to many depictions of this Japanese style bridge he had built there.

To finish off, here is a lovely picture called the Garden at Sainte-Adresse.  Who wouldn't want to have a garden with a sea view like this?