Boy in the Country
1857
Medium
Graphite on ivory wove paper
Dimensions
30.7 × 23 cm (12 1/8 × 9 1/16 in.)
Classification
prints and drawing
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
186315
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
This energetic study comes from a sketchbook that Monet kept when he was no more than 17 years old. Since none of his paintings from this period survive, the work offers a rare glimpse of his early talent. His chosen subject—perhaps a native of his coastal hometown, Le Havre—could well have been captured spontaneously. The boy’s clothing obscures his anatomy, but the outlines of his smock are crisp and decisive. It seems as if the artist applied considerable pressure to the pencil. In describing...
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...