Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare Saint-Lazare
1877
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
60.3 × 80.2 cm (23 3/4 × 31 1/2 in.); Framed: 80.7 × 100.4 × 10.2 cm (31 3/4 × 39 1/2 × 4 in.)
Classification
painting
Department
Painting and Sculpture of Europe
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
16571
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
One of the most avant-garde aspects of the Impressionists was their choice of subject matter, which frequently included scenes derived from modern, industrial Paris, from iron bridges to exhibition halls to train sheds. The train station at Saint-Lazare would have been a familiar, meaningful sight to Claude Monet in the 1870s. The terminal linked Paris to Normandy, where the artist developed his technique of painting outdoors in the 1860s. It was also the point of departure for the towns and vil...
About the Artist
Claude Monet · 1840–1926
Claude Monet, born Oscar-Claude Monet on November 14, 1840, in Paris and raised in Le Havre, Normandy, began his artistic journey as a successful teenage caricaturist. His formal training started at the Le Havre secondary school of the arts in 1851, where he received his first drawing lessons from Jacques-François Ochard. Around 1858, he met Eugène Boudin, who became his pivotal mentor, introducin...