Displaying items by tag: Water Lilies

A new garden-themed art exhibition will tell the intriguing story about Claude Monet and the famous water lily pond that inspired his best-known works.

Monet's later years saw him obsessively paint the lilies in his garden at Giverny, in northern France.

But his artistic legacy could have looked very different had Monet's rural neighbors had their way.

An iconic painting of water lilies by Claude Monet helped Sotheby’s (BID) sell 122 million pounds ($208 million) of Impressionist and modern art in London.

Yesterday evening’s tally represented a 15 percent increase from a year ago and was Sotheby’s third highest result for the category in London. Of the 46 lots offered only four failed to find buyers as Russian, Asian and American collectors competed for works by Pablo Picasso and Wassily Kandinsky. The sale also benefited from the presence of several estates, including that of Jan Krugier, a prominent art dealer who died in 2008.

Sotheby’s London is offering as a highlight of the Impressionist & Modern Art Evening Sale on Monday 23rd June 2014 Claude Monet’s Nymphéas (Water Lilies) of 1906, estimated at £20-30 million/ $33-50 million. Instantly recognisable and revered the world over, Claude Monet’s Nymphéas are among the most iconic and celebrated paintings of turn of the century. The profound impact the series has made on the evolution of modern art marks them out as Monet’s greatest achievement.

This painting was selected by the artist to be exhibited at his seminal exhibition held at the Galerie Durand- Ruel, Paris, in 1909 to unveil his Water Lily paintings in a show dedicated purely to this subject. It had also been singled out and acquired by Paul Durand-Ruel - the legendary art dealer who championed the Impressionists and represented Monet, among many other of the greatest artists of his time – and it remained in his personal collection throughout his lifetime. The painting has since been widely exhibited at some of the world’s most prestigious international museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris, and since 2011 has been on loan to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. It is this painting, together with the others in this series, that eventually led to Monet’s Les Grandes décorations which were painted between 1914-26, now in the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris.

40 paintings by Claude Monet from the private Marmottan Monet Museum in Paris are on view in the basement of Shanghai’s K11 Art Mall, a collection of designer boutiques and cafes interspersed with art displays. The show, which is China’s largest exhibition of Monet paintings ever opened, features some of the artist’s most well-known masterpieces including works from his “Water Lilies” series.

The exhibition’s organizers are hoping that the show will attract between 200,000 and 300,000 visitors durings its three-month run. Due to security concerns, only 3,000 people will be allowed to view the exhibition per day. The show is part of a series of events aimed at celebrating the 50th anniversary of diplomatic ties between France and China.

The paintings on display represent about half of the Marmottan Museum’s Monet holdings. The institution’s collection also includes works by Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, Paul Gauguin, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

"Master of Impressionism -- Claude Monet" will be on view at the K11 Art Mall through June 15.

Earlier this year, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston invited the public to choose works for a special Impressionist exhibition. Over 24 days, fans chose from a selection of fifty works from the MFA’s Impressionist collection, casting their votes through the museum’s website or Facebook page. After receiving 41,497 submissions, the MFA has opened “Boston Loves Impressionism,” its first crowdsourced exhibition.

Participants expressed particular adoration for Vincent van Gogh’s “Houses at Auvers,” Claude Monet’s “Water Lilies,” and Edgar Degas’ “Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer.” In addition to the 30 works from the MFA’s collection, the exhibit includes five loans from local collectors.

Malcolm Rogers, Ann and Graham Gund Director of the MFA, said, “While the museum’s popular European Impressionism Gallery is closed for renovation, we thought it would be exciting to let the public choose which of their favorite works would remain on view. This is the first time we’ve ever presented an exhibition selected by the public.”

“Boston Loves Impressionism” will remain on view in the MFA’s Lois and Michael Torf Gallery through May 26, 2014.

This spring, Christie’s will sell approximately 400 items from the collection of Huguette Clark, a reclusive copper heiress. The auction house has revealed that the trove includes Claude Monet’s ‘Water Lilies’, which has not been exhibited publicly since 1926 and is expected to fetch between $25 million and $35 million, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s ‘Young Women Playing Badminton,’ which is expected to bring between $10 million and $15 million.

Clark’s collection also includes musical instruments, Gilded Age furniture and rare books. The trove will be divided among two sales -- one on May 6 that will include the Monet and Renoir paintings, and another on June 18. The entire collection is expected to fetch more than $50 million. Before the sales, highlights from Clark’s holdings will go on view at Christie’s London and then at various locations throughout Asia.

Clark was the daughter of U.S. senator and copper tycoon, William A. Clark. Beginning in 1930, she led a largely reclusive life and when she passed away in 2011, she left behind an estate worth nearly $300 million. The proceeds from the upcoming sales will go to the estate, which will most likely be distributed between art institutions and distant relatives.

Known for her extravagant shoe collection, one-time Philippine first lady, Imelda Marcos, also accrued an admirable art collection during her late husband’s reign. Marcos’ former secretary, Vilma Bautisa, was indicted on Tuesday, November 20^th, on charges of conspiracy, tax fraud, and offering a false instrument for filing, all relating to artworks that had previously belonged to Marcos. 74-year-old Bautista acquired a number of important paintings from Marcos and her husband, Ferdinand, after his regime came crashing down in 1986 after a citizen revolt.

The Manhattan District Attorney hit Bautista, a New York resident, with charges that she was conspiring to sell paintings that were the legal property of the Philippine government. The District Attorney’s office claims that Bautista used false paperwork to sell Le Bassin aux Nymphéas (1899) from Claude Monet’s Water Lilies series in September 2010 for $32 million. The other works in Bautista’s possession are Monet’s L’Eglise et La Seine a Vétheuil (1881), Alfred Sisley’s Langland Bay (1887), and Albert Marquet’s Le Cypres de Djenan Sidi Said (1946). The four paintings involved in the suit once hung in a Manhattan town house used by Imelda Marcos and her husband.

Two of Bautista’s nephews were also charged but did not appear in court. Bautista pleaded not guilty and was released on a $175,000 bond.

f impressionist master Claude Monet’s “Water Lilies” triptychs, separated 50 years ago and sold to three museums, has been reunited in a multifaceted exhibit that highlights not only the three-panel artwork, but the artist too.

“I think all of us think of Monet as this father of Impressionism, as this painter who was spontaneous, who painted outdoors in his garden,” said Nicole Myers, associate curator at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, where “Monet’s Water Lilies” opens April 9. “That was certainly true. He presented himself that way publicly, really to the end of his life.”

But Monet had another side that’s also detailed in the exhibition, which ends Aug. 7 before moving on to the St. Louis Art Museum and then to the Cleveland Museum of Art.

“With these later paintings from the 20th century that he’s working on, you see the sort of obsessive, almost obsessive-compulsive, artist who came indoors and worked tirelessly making revisions again and again in this kind of obsessive way,” she said.

It’s unclear if Monet ever considered the three panels finished, she said.

“And it really blows out of the water this impression we have of this man who just sort of dashed off his first thoughts and left things alone. He worked on them almost consistently from 1915 to 1926,” Myers said.

The three panels, each 6-feet tall and 14-feet wide, languished in Monet’s studio at Giverny outside Paris after his death in 1926, Myers said. The pieces on display at the Nelson-Atkins comprise one of two of Monet’s Water Lily triptychs in the U.S. The other is at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where they are a steady, popular selection.

“What’s amazing about them is the mood they create in the room where they’re installed,” said Ann Temkin’s, MoMA’s chief curator of paintings and sculpture. “It’s a magical one. It becomes a very quiet place. The visitors become quite contemplative.”