Claude Monet – Vétheuil (1880)

 

In the view of Vétheuil, Monet depicts a summery river landscape. The foreground on the right is dominated by a field painted in green and yellow dots. Behind it, the Seine flows from the lower left corner to the right edge of the painting. While on the right it appears in long, blue-white brushstrokes, on the left side the reflection of the sky and vegetation on the opposite bank is depicted in short green, white, and blue strokes. The vegetation is divided into a flat growth in lush green in the center, behind it there is a sprawling blue-green shrubbery from the center to the left edge of the painting, and finally a broad row of dark green "cypress-like poplars" towering over everything. While the shrubbery has a "foamy, undulating" brushstroke, the poplars are characterized by elongated vertical brushstrokes. The view of Vétheuil is partially obscured by this vegetation, with only the tower of the Notre-Dame church protruding in the center of the painting. Other buildings of the town can be seen on the left edge behind the shrubbery and on the right half of the painting along the river. Behind Vétheuil, the gentle green hills of the Seine valley rise. Above it all, a blue sky with dense swirling white clouds can be seen, which Monet painted in "curves of larger radii". In several places in the sky area, the primed canvas is visible, emphasizing the spontaneous and sketchy execution of the painting.

Monet in Vétheuil

Monet lived in Vétheuil, a town located about 60 km west of Paris on the Seine River, from 1878 to 1881. These years were a time of change for the painter, both in his personal and artistic life. When Monet left his previous residence in Argenteuil with his wife Camille and son Jean in early 1878, he was in a very tense financial situation. He had significant rent debts and could not pay his bills. During this time, he found it difficult to find buyers for his work, and the pieces sold for relatively low prices. Additionally, his wife was expecting their second child. He was occasionally supported by friends such as the painter Édouard Manet, the writer Emile Zola, or the doctor Paul Gachet.

In the spring of 1878, Monet lived temporarily in Paris, where his second son Michel was born in March. In September of that year, Monet moved to Vétheuil, and his family followed shortly thereafter. The family of Monet's friend Ernest Hoschedé also moved into the rented house in Vétheuil. Hoschedé, who had previously declared bankruptcy for his textile company, stayed in Vétheuil for only a few weeks and soon returned to Paris. However, his wife Alice and the six children of the couple continued to live together with the Monets in Vétheuil. Camille Monet had not recovered from her pregnancy, and she was diagnosed with pelvic cancer shortly thereafter. She died in the fall of 1879 at the age of 32. Alice Hoschedé took care of her, as well as the eight children in the house. Claude Monet and Alice Hoschedé lived together as a couple in the coming years and later married.

During his time in Vétheuil, Monet painted numerous landscape paintings, often depicting views of the Seine. Sometimes he showed the river landscape without any direct reference to the location, as in winter motifs such as Ice Drift, 1879 (University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbour), or the summer view Seine at Vétheuil, 1880 (National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.). In these paintings, neither the buildings of the town nor any people are visible. Occasionally, Monet looked across the river from Vétheuil, for example, in the painting Lavacourt, 1880 (Dallas Museum of Art). However, he often showed the view from the opposite direction. In a series of views, Monet's gaze goes from the Seine banks in Lavacourt over the river to Vétheuil with its striking church. Examples of this are Vétheuil, 1879 (National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne) and Vétheuil in Winter, 1879 (Frick Collection, New York City). The Berlin view of Vétheuil also includes space for a meadow in the foreground. This element is found in a similar variation in the painting Poppy Field at Vétheuil, 1879 (E.G. Bührle Collection, Zurich). In this view, the meadow with its lush poppy flower abundance occupies much more pictorial space, and the river appears only as a narrow strip in the middle ground. Other views painted by Monet in the summer of 1880 with a view of Vétheuil are the paintings Vétheuil in Summer (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City) and Vétheuil (private collection), which, apart from the missing meadow in the foreground, have great visual similarities to the Berlin view of Vétheuil and were created at around the same time.

In Vétheuil, Monet further developed his painting style. He applied the paint mostly with small strokes, showed a "lively" brushwork, and developed "a new pastel-like colorfulness". In addition, he separated himself from his painter friends and did not participate in the Impressionists' group exhibition in 1880. Instead, he submitted works again to the traditional annual Salon de Paris, where the motif Lavacourt from 1880 (Dallas Museum of Art) was accepted by the jury. Furthermore, in June 1880, Monet had his first solo exhibition in the rooms of the magazine La Vie moderne. Both exhibitions brought Monet the desired attention, and slowly his financial situation began to improve.