Water Lily Pond
1917–19
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
130.2 × 201.9 cm (51 1/2 × 79 1/2 in.); Framed: 147.4 × 218.5 × 9.9 cm (58 × 86 × 3 7/8 in.)
Classification
painting
Department
Painting and Sculpture of Europe
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
97933
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
During World War I, after several years of inactivity because of bad health and grief over the death of his second wife, Claude Monet embarked on a period of intense work. Building a large studio and improving his garden, he began a group of monumental paintings of water lilies that he would later offer to the French state. Alongside this project, he painted a suite of 19 smaller canvases, including the present one. There is evidence—including a few photographs of the artist working in his garde...
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...