Claude Monet is at the Palazzo Ducale di Genova until May 22, 2022 with the exhibition “Monet Masterpieces from the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris.”
Monet, Painter of Light
The artist is perhaps the most renowned among all representatives of French Impressionism.
Born in Paris in 1840, Oscar Claude Monet was one of the founders of the artistic movement and remains one of its most consistent and prolific representatives today. Alongside him worked artists such as Renoir, Sisley, and Caillebotte.
Driven from a young age by a strong inclination towards the arts and painting, a pivotal moment for him was his encounter with Eugène Boudin, a framer from Gravier’s who, admiring his talent, considered his works to be stunning, full of life, and exciting. It was Boudin who directed the artist towards creating en plein air (outdoor) works that, over the centuries, earned him a place in the history of art.
Before long, Monet became the painter of light, air, and indeed, of impression, which is nothing more than an exact moment captured like a photograph on canvas. Today, his works are displayed in the most important museums around the world.
Monet and the Masterpieces from the Musée Marmottan
The exhibition Monet Masterpieces from the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris at the Palazzo Ducale di Genova features fifty works from the French museum, curated by Marianne Mathieu, art historian and scientific director of the Marmottan.
As visitors proceed through the seven sections in which the exhibition is divided, they can trace the artistic evolution of the French master up to the masterpieces that best represent his studies on light and its changes.
Palazzo Ducale serves as the setting for a show described as intimate that encompasses the works to which the painter was most attached and which he kept with him until his death on December 5, 1926.
The Water Lilies
When discussing works dear to Monet and exhibited in the show, it is inevitable to refer to the Water Lilies that the artist painted repeatedly and obsessively from 1890 until the end of his days.
The cycle of Water Lilies, which includes over 250 works, is now owned by the French State.
The Years in Giverny
The garden of his home in Giverny along with the artificial lake he built there, were a source of inspiration for Monet: he spent entire days capturing every subtle change in light and translating it onto canvas.
His project, to which he remained faithful, consisted of painting the water lilies on large canvases, going against the impressionist tradition that favored smaller formats for the chosen subjects.
Although these flowers are the symbolic work of Impressionism, they are also an attempt at his evolution.
Monet, who worked tirelessly in every season, began to finish the canvases inside his studio during the colder months, interrupting the creative process that was no longer realized only en plein air, but was also the result of a memory imprinted in his mind.
The painter, in fact, came to paint the water lilies having almost completely lost his sight, which is why memory was crucial in the creation of the canvases.
Changing the method of executing the work inevitably alters the technique: the brushstrokes he applies to the canvas are now increasingly approximate, distant from meticulous detail and closer to a sort of abstractionism.
Monet Masterpieces from the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris is an unmissable opportunity to delve into the artistic evolution of one of the most beloved figures in 20th-century art.
