Claude Monet

Georges Charpentier, Paris (acquired from the artist in May 1876 and sold: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, April 11, 1907, lot 20)

Bernheim-Jeune, Paris (acquired at the above sale)

Jos. Hessel, Paris (by 1908)

Collection X (sold: Hôtel Drouot, Paris, March 5, 1912, lot 20)

Bernheim-Jeune, Paris (acquired at the above sale)

Durand-Ruel, Paris (by 1916)

Jean d'Alayer, Paris (acquired from the above)

Sale: Sotheby's, London, May 6, 1959, lot 12

Emerson (acquired at the above sale)

Mrs. Thelam Cazalet-Keir, London (sold: Sotheby's, London, July 1, 1964, lot 76a)

Schoneman Gallery, New York (acquired at the above sale)

Acquired by the family of the present owner by the 1960s

M. Rostand, Quelques amateurs de l'époque Impressionniste (unpublished thesis), Ecole du Louvre, Paris, 1955, discussed pp. 241 and 245

Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet, Biographie et catalogue raisonné, vol. 1, Lausanne and Paris, 1974,  no. 427, illustrated p. 299

Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet, Biographie et catalogue raisonné, , vol. 5, Lausanne and Paris, 1991, no. 427, listed p. 31

Paul Hayes Tucker, Monet at Argenteuil, New Haven and London, 1982, illustrated pl. XXXI

Paul Hayes Tucker, Claude Monet, Life and Work, New Haven and London, 1995, illustrated p. 93

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet, Catalogue raisonné, vol. II, Cologne, 1996,  no. 427, illustrated p. 173

Monet spent the majority of his time between 1871 and 1878 painting in the picturesque town of Argenteuil, a suburb of Paris just fifteen minutes away by train.  Some of his most important early Impressionist landscapes depict the scenery along the banks of the Seine, where he would set up his easel and paint en plein air.   According to Daniel Wildenstein, the present painting depicts the view looking towards Bezons, with the Colombes bank on the left and the Ile Marante on the right.

Paul Tucker has written the following about this picture:  "There are several paintings from 1876 of the Seine at Argenteuil in autumn, such as The Petit Bras in Autumn, that indicate that Monet made at least one trip home from Montgeron.  These paintings are evidence of his orientations as well as his travels.  They show not the boat basin of the Seine, but the idyllic Petit Bras which he had painted that spring for the first time in three years.  Consciously anti-modern, these paintings attempt to recapture the naiveté of an eroded rural tradition.  They also recall the real retreats in Montgeron; only the sparser undergrowth and the prominent poplars separate them from the View of the Yerres.  And they too predict Monet's work in the years to come" (Tucker, op. cit., pp. 167-69).