Title: Saules au bord de l’Yerres
Artist: Claude Monet (French, 1840-1926)
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 54.4 x 65.7 cm
Date Created: 1876
Description
Claude Monet possessed a singular gift for capturing the fluidity and transparency of water—whether sea or river, grey or sky-reflected. The poet Stéphane Mallarmé once wrote: “I have never seen a boat poised more lightly on the water than in his pictures, nor a veil more mobile and light than his moving atmosphere. It is truly a marvel.”
Painted in 1876, Saules au bord de l’Yerres (Willows by the Banks of the Yerres) renders the lush, idyllic riverscape with sumptuous brushwork and rich tonal harmony. During the latter half of 1876, Monet stayed in the quiet hamlet of Montgeron, enchanted by the serene beauty along the Yerres. The canvas depicts a calm stretch of water whose glassy surface mirrors the verdant willows on the bank, blurring the boundary between reality and reflection. The interplay of light and shadow, water and sky, illustrates Monet’s maturing Impressionist technique and compositional deftness.
The painting’s creation is also intertwined with the vital network of supporters that sustained Monet’s early career. In the summer of 1876, he accepted an invitation from his friend and patron Ernest Hoschedé to produce a series of large-scale works for the dining room of Hoschedé’s country estate. An early champion of Impressionism, Hoschedé offered Monet both refuge and inspiration.
Image Download
Image Dimensions: 3200 x 2637 pixels
Image Size: 1.03 MB
Image Format: JPG
Print Resolution: 300 dpi
Download Format: ZIP Archive
License: Public Domain, Free for Commercial Use
