Claude Monet

In 1878 Monet executed two still-lifes on the subject of chrysanthemums: the present work, and its sister painting now in the collection of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris (fig. 1). Both are executed in a horizontal format, with flowers in a bright red vase set against the blue background. With the bouquet positioned slightly off-centre, and flowers spilling out of the vase and onto the table, the composition has a spontaneous, rather than carefully staged quality, further emphasised by the quick, free brushwork. Chrysanthèmes beautifully demonstrates Monet's ability to evoke the lavishness and vitality of the flowers, without relying on the trompe -l'oeil technique often associated with the genre of still-life. Instead, he drew upon his own creative ingenuity and his impressions of the image, rendering it with extraordinary freshness and a sense of spontaneity.

Monet returned to the subject of chrysanthemums two years later, in a larger canvas now in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (fig. 2). In 1882 Paul Durand-Ruel commissioned Monet to create a series of paintings to decorate six doors of his grand salon in Paris. Over the next three years the artist executed a total of 36 floral still-lifes to be placed in the doors, and for some of these he chose to return to the theme of chrysanthemums. Discussing Chrysanthèmes at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and related still-lifes, Richard Thomson commented: 'Monet painted such canvases with a flourish, confident in his ability to animate any still-life motif with the vivacity of his brushwork, unity of his light, and coherence of his chromatics, and without excessive commitment to surface exactitude' (R. Thomson, Monet. The Seine and The Sea 1878-1883 (exhibition catalogue), National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh, 2003, p. 76).

The subject of a lush and abundant bouquet of flowers would certainly have appealed to Monet and he often returned to it, in between working on his landscapes. In the late 1870s and early 1880s, both Monet and Renoir painted several floral still-lifes, a subject that was most readily saleable, and therefore provided a secure source of income to both artists. Monet exhibited several still-lifes of flowers during the impressionist exhibitions of the late 1870s, and it was largely due to the artist's success in these exhibitions that the dealer Durand-Ruel began to buy his paintings regularly. The image of chrysanthemums would have appealed to the contemporary audiences, as this was a popular flower in the second half of the nineteenth century. Monet's choice of subject, however, was not based only on its commercial appeal, but also on his love for chrysanthemums, which he cultivated in the heated greenhouse in his garden at Giverny, where he moved several years later.

Monet executed far fewer floral still-lifes than landscapes throughout his career, and it is interesting to note the artist's ability to adapt his technique, developed through painting en plein-air, to a different genre. Monet painted the present work with careful attention to the rendering the effects of light. He created a dynamic composition by juxtaposing the bright brushstrokes of the petals with the deeper tones of the leaves, and the very subtle shadows on the blue background and the tabletop.  

The first owner of the present work was the artist Moïse Dreyfus, who acquired the painting from Monet through his friend Mary Cassatt, and it remained in his family until it was auctioned in Paris in 1987.