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From 1883 until 1926, the acclaimed French painter Claude Monet, one of the founders of impressionist painting, spent 43 years living at his Giverny home in France. Monet’s Giverny Garden is open to the public from April 1 to November 1 each year; visitors can still experience the ambiance of the acclaimed artist, strolling through his house and grounds, marveling at the floral compositions and water lilies. “Then, he (Claude Monet) increasingly refined the sensation of painting the moment, the impressionist painting, and the immediacy. That is, one could deliver a canvas of each moment. After this series period, between 1890 – 1895, he began to work on his garden.” “This theme of the garden, the way he conceived it, inspired him like a painting. This means that it was a masterpiece, a work of art in nature. The garden of Giverny is neither a French nor an English garden, and it owes much to the gardens of Bordighera.” Madame Patin explains the importance of light in Monet’s paintings. “The landscape in Normandy is lit by a very particular light, quite variable. He also studied the light at the water’s edge, of the water lily pond. He studied it through the foliage, as he had done at a very young age in his first paintings. In the ‘Women in the Garden’ or in ‘Luncheon on the Grass,’ we see the light filtering through the foliage of the trees.” Monet was also greatly influenced by Japanese art. Beginning in the 1860s, Monet developed a fascination for collecting Japanese prints that lasted for more than three decades. “He took this bridge, which is found in certain prints, and that is totally an idea from Japan.” Madame Patin speaks more about Monet’s famous “Water Lilies” series. “There are eight of them in the Orangery, in the two rooms devoted to the large motifs of the ‘Water Lilies.’ These large paintings show his idea to create, he said ‘like a large aquarium,’ a large room where you can be immersed in the ‘Water Lilies.’ This is the effect of the Orangery, where you are in the center, and the ‘Water Lilies’ are all around you.”
