Claude Monet
Claude Monet
Oscar-Claude Monetwas a founder of French Impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. The term "Impressionism" is derived from the title of his painting Impression, soleil levant, which was exhibited in 1874 in the first of the independent exhibitions mounted by Monet and his associates as an alternative to the Salon de Paris...
NationalityFrench
ProfessionPainter
Date of Birth14 November 1840
CityParis, France
CountryFrance
As for myself, I met with as much success as I ever could have wanted. In other words, I was enthusiastically run-down by every critic of the period.
What is it that's taken hold of me, for me to carry on like this in relentless pursuit of something beyond my powers?
I have made tremendous efforts to work in a darker register and express the sinister and tragic quality of the place, given my natural tendency to work in light and pale tones.
The Thames was all gold. God it was beautiful, so fine that I began working a frenzy, following the sun and its reflections on the water.
Listening only to my instincts, I discovered superb things.
I think only of my painting, and if I were to drop it, I think I'd go crazy.
Nature won't be summoned to order and won't be kept waiting. It must be caught, well caught.
What can be said about a man who is interested in nothing but his painting? It's a pity if a man can only interest himself in one thing. But I can't do any thing else. I have only one interest.
When I look at nature I feel as if I'll be able to paint it all, note it all down, and then you might as well forget it once you're working...
It really is appallingly difficult to do something which is complete in every respect, and I think most people are content with mere approximations. Well, my dear friend, I intend to battle on, scrape off and start again...
My rejection at the Salon brought an end to my hesitation [to settle in Paris] since after this failure I can no longer claim to cope... alas, that fatal rejection has virtually taken the bread out of my mouth.
Getting up at 4 in the morning, I slave away all day until by the evening I'm exhausted, and I end by forgetting all my responsibilities, thinking only of the work I've set out to do.
I have once more taken up things that can't be done: water with grasses weaving on the bottom. But I'm always tackling that sort of thing!
For almost two months now I've been struggling away with no result.