Monet loses eyesight (Japanese Bridge)

Claude Monet
Beethoven composed the 9th symphony deaf. – But painting blind? That’s impossible. I had large-scale paintings of water lilies as a reflective landscape in mind. Without horizon. The illusion of an infinite whole. Presented in a room in such a way, that the viewer is surrounded by water, submersed in the pond and the water lilies. And forget everything around them. My garden is disappearing. Contrasts are undefined. Shapes blur into each other. I use almost only red and brown tones. I can’t see other colors. I will never accomplish something beautiful again.

Regaining eyesight, destruction of paintings

Claude Monet
I have gone through two eye operations. And today I will finally receive a fitting pair of glasses.

Birth & childhood 

Narrator
Oscar Claude Monet is born in 1840 in Paris. The boy who everyone calls «Oscar» grows up in modest conditions. The financial crisis is in full swing. His father’s colonial goods store is doing poorly. As a result, the family moves to Le Havre in 1845. Oscar is 5 years old. By the age of 15, as a high school student, Monet already attracts attention with caricatures of teachers and public figures. The painter Eugène Boudin notices Monet’s talent and encourages him to paint landscapes.

Young Painter

Claude Monet
I had just turned 17, then. But I knew that I wanted to be a painter. And paint just as the bird sings. I learned to comprehend and love nature. With the pen I analysed all its shapes.

First acknowledgement / Paris Salon

Narrator
Claude Monet’s first critical acclaim comes with the painting «La Pointe de la Hève at Low Tide». It is shown in the Paris Salon – at the time the most important forum for the work of French painters.

Luncheon on the Grass, Fragments, 1866

Narrator
But Monet wants more: For the year 1866 he plans a figure painting in a large format. On a 4 x 6 meter canvas a fashionable Parisian picknick party of twelve gathers in a birch forest. His painter friend Bazille and his 19-year old lover Camille stand and lie in the forest as models.

Claude Monet
I worked on «Luncheon on the Grass» like mad. But all the rain and an injury to my leg put a spoke in my wheel. I just couldn’t finish it in time! Later I left the finished painting as collateral to my landlord. When I redeemed it years later, the right part was moldy (laughs about his young self).

The Woman in the Green Dress (Camille)

Narrator
Instead, the artist paints his future wife Camille life sized in only four days. «The Woman in the Green Dress» would become a great success for Monet at the Paris Salon in 1866.

Critic 1
Look at the dress. How lively!

Critic 2
He manages to capture the fleeting nature of the moment!

Critic 3
The vitality! As if she were just turning to leave.

Themes Light / Shadow / Water / Wind

Narrator
Soon, Monet no longer focuses on painting people. His interest turns to sunlight. The glow of the flowers. And shadows in all colours. Reflections in the water. And with his studio boat he goes right into the motif of water.

Claude Monet
I wanted to copy nature, but it was impossible. The landscape changes with every passing moment. It only comes alive through its environment. Through the ever-changing air and light. One can’t replicate the sun. But, as I’m discovering, you can show it through something else. Through color.

Narrator
Monet finds his central themes: Light and shadow. Wind and water.

Sunrise

Narrator
Morning mood in the port of Le Havre. Outlines of ships. Chimneys in the fog. Thin paint. Delicate strokes. The rising sun reflects orange in the water. Diverse broken shades of grey.

Claude Monet
Others painted a bridge, a house, a boat and that’s it. I wanted to paint the beauty of the air surrounding the bridge, the house, the boat. I am not interested in the object itself, but what happens between the object and me.

Narrator
With the painting «Impression, Sunrise» Monet created a work that divided the critics.

Critic 1
This self-proclaimed artist takes canvas and a brush, throws paint on it randomly and signs the whole thing.

Critic 2
This is merely a sketch!

Critic 3
Even a wallpaper in its original state is more elaborate!

Narrator
The work gives the impressionist style its name. A well-meaning critic sums up the new style of painting:

Critic 4
The Impressionists do not reproduce a landscape, but the impression it evokes.

Claude Monet
The moment in its fleetingness. The immediacy that contains a hidden truth. Reproducing that was fascinating to me. But has also brought me to dispair again and again. For in capturing the fleeting lies an irreconcilable contradiction.

Streets and Life in Paris

Narrator
Academic preferences at this time are nationalistic historical paintings, ancient heroes and chivalric romances. But Monet consistently puts his will for actuality into practice. He pays enthusiastic homage to the modernised cityscape of Paris. He finds a symbol for his fascination of modern technology, industrial development and speed in the railway and paints bridges, train stations and steam locomotives.

Steam Locomotives

Claude Monet
I placed my easel in the middle of the hustle and bustle at the Saint- Lazare station in Paris and painted for days on the platform, while the passengers around me streamed to the trains. I had trains stopped for me, platforms blocked, and locomotives stuffed with coal so that they would blow out as much steam as I liked.

Bankruptcy of Sponsor Hoschedé, price collapse, failure, existential distress

Narrator
Ernest Hoschedé, great sponsor and collector of impressionist art, goes bankrupt in 1876. A catastrophe for the impressionists. The Monet-paintings, too, are sold at the foeclosure at bargain prices. With their 6 children the Hoschedés move in with the Monets. The new extended family lacks everything: food, heating material, clothing. Monet, now 40 years old, has to start over.

Claude Monet
I didn’t have a single Sou. And no credit, either. Neither at the bakery nor at the butcher. I couldn’t even buy canvas and paints anymore. I cursed myself and my paintings

Death of Camille Monet

Narrator
Camille dies of abdominal cancer, weakened by a failed abortion attempt, in September of 1879. She was only 32. Monet loses the mother of his two children. His «Woman in the Green Dress». His model. His beloved, who in his pictures strolls through meadows and poppy fields with a parasol and a fluttering summer dress.

Claude Monet
At dawn I found myself at the headof a dead woman’s bed. My eyes clung rigidly to the tragic temple. I observed the colours of death that settled on her face in progressive gradations. Blue, yellow, grey hues. Violet. Suddenly my reflexes took me captive against my will. And the ordinary way of life set in.

Narrator
Monet paints his wife on her deathbed. The dead woman’s face sinks dimly into the icy cold of the pillow. Warm sunlight falls on the bed from one side. As if the painter wanted to warm Camille’s rigid face with the first rays of
sunshine. The warm light of the morning stands in stark contrast with the coldness of death.

Winter

Narrator
For Monet This winter in Vétheuil is especially severe, icy and grey.

Cliffs as projection surfaces of light, painter of the sea

Narrator
Claude Monet begins to be more productive again in 1882 on the Norman coast.

Claude Monet
I was enthralled by this area because it forced me to go beyond what I usually did.

Narrator
In Varengeville Monet paints «The Fisherman’s House at Varengeville», «Custom’s Post at Dieppe» and a Chapel above the sea from different perspectives. Monet discovers cliffs as projection surfaces of light and fully becomes the «painter of the sea».

Haystacks, Waterloo Bridge, poplars, Rouen Cathedral

Narrator
Monet begins capturing the same motives from the same perspectives in the light of different times of day and seasons.

Claude Monet
The first glance at a motif is the least clouded by prejudice. That is why I often imagined I was born a blind person who could suddenly see. And begins painting without knowing what the object before his eyes even is.

Narrator
Monet consciously brings in more and more his subjective feeling of what he sees. Painted colour effects are invented rather than actually seen that way. After years of hardship, Monet finally achieves a breakthrough with his series.

Riviera

Claude Monet
The motif is never what it is, but what the light makes of it.

Narrator
In the search for different light, Monet travels to different countries throughout his life. He is inspired by the pines and palm trees of the Riviera and has great success with these pictures.

Venice

Narrator
Monets last trip brings him to Venice. As he had done earlier with his studio boat on the Seine, here too he goes right into the middle of his subject and paints from a gondola in St Mark’s Basin just above the surface of the water. The paintings are more visions than visual experiences: The impressionist has turned into a symbolist. Monet celebrates the mystical combination of fog and architecture, of material and atmosphere, of stone and light.

Claude Monet
Everyone pretends as if they understand my art. But one doesn’t have to understand it – Only love it.

The Garden of Giverny

Narrator
From 1883, Monet rents the house in Giverny. He buys it in 1890. The two storey house offers enough space for his large family. The barn is turned into a studio. Through the efforts of the entire family, the Norman orchard is turned into a lush flower garden. Paths separate the flowerbeds, which are planted according to strict color schemes. Monet later bought the adjacent land and in 1893 laid out a water garden based on Far Eastern examples with many exotic plants. Here is where the famous japanese bridge stands. A garden like a painting. Colourful splendour wherever you look.

Claude Monet
I think my garden is my most beautiful masterpiece.

Narrator
It is the garden that will go down in history. The pond and the water lilies will become the defining motif of the last 20 years of Monets life. Monet becomes one with his garden. The garden becomes part of his body. His soul. His eye. In 1899, he has a second studio built and begins painting the water lily pictures. Later, a third studio is built: 12 by 24 meters large and with huge skylights. Monet can work here in daylight.

Claude Monet
I think from the beginning I owed it to the flowers that I became a painter.

Narrator
Yet, Monet is not a flower painter. The flowers are mere carriers of light and feast of colour for the eyes.

Water Lily Paintings

Narrator
Monet immerses himself in the work on the water lily paintings. Gradually getting closer to the motif. Dives in. He wants to create a monumental piece. It is a race against time. Monet suffers from cataracts in both eyes. Slowly but surely he will lose his eyesight.

Loss of eyesight / Regaining eyesight / Motivation

Narrator
Monsieur Monet? Monsieur Monet!

Claude Monet
Mmmh …

Narrator
You can see with you new pair of glasses!

Claude Monet
Yes, I saw what I painted half blind …

Narrator
Are you going to finish the Water Lilies?

Claude Monet
The paintings are terrible. I have destroyed them.

Narrator
But now that you can see, will you continue the work? Monsieur Monet!

Water Lily Decoration

Narrator
Claude Monet manages to complete the water lilies before his death. The 91- metre-long and 2-metre-high painting is the pinnacle of his work, for which he would only become famous many years later.

Claude Monet
I had large-scale paintings of water lilies as a reflective landscape in mind. Without horizon. The illusion of an infinite whole. Presented in a room in such a way, that the viewer is surrounded by water, submersed in the pond and the waterlilies. And forget everything around them.

Thank you for visiting «Monets Garden»!