25 Shades of Monet: A Revelation in Haystacks

kittyandcheese (53)in #art • 6 years ago (edited)

Claude Monet, Haystacks, (sunset), 1890–1891

Haystacks is the name of a 25 canvas series painted by Claude Monet, father of French Impressionist painting. The series depicts stacks of grain in diverse lights and seasons. Monet painted the canvases from the summer of 1890 through to the following spring.

A note for those who care about these things: Haystacks is the popular English name for this series but in reality the stacks were most likely wheat, oats or barley.

Claude Monet, Wheatstacks (End of Summer), 1890-91

I had never heard of the series when I saw some of the canvases exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago. I knew of Monet as 'the water lilies guy, right?'. If you asked my opinion of impressionist art, I probably would have said vaguely that I thought it was pretty. The truth is that I like a solid line. Blurry makes me nervous.

Walking in to the room that held Monet's Haystacks, however, was a literal revelation. I became an immediate convert to the importance of seeing art in person. What you can't see on a computer screen is the depth - the layering of the brush strokes, one colour filtered through the colour on top of it. Not to gush but it was like seeing for the first time.

Claude Monet, Grainstacks, White Frost Effect, 1889

Maybe it was because I already had a fondness for hay bales standing in fields, which I used to sit on to sneak a smoke as a kid on a farm (a really stupid place to smoke now that I think about it), but the idea of Monet heading outdoors to paint these grain stacks over and over again, to see the way the light moved over and around them, to pick out the tufted grass with delicate colour...well...I was speechless.

Claude Monet, Haystacks on a Foggy Morning, 1891

I recently watched a video that talked about the importance of imposing limitations on your creativity. The idea is that by limiting yourself, maybe by a colour as in Picasso's famous Blue Period or perhaps by subject matter as in Monet's hay stacks, you actually allow yourself to be more freely creative. I think I get it.

By the way, my vision of Monet serenely painting as the sun moved across the big bowl of an artistically blue sky was not exactly accurate. Monet was a perfectionist and the light kept changing, so he found himself switching between up to twelve canvases at a time to capture the brief subtle changes. He would wake at dawn to be able to cover all of the possible light conditions and his stepdaughter Blanche would trundle the canvases out to him in a wheelbarrow.

Claude Monet, Wheatstack (Thaw, Sunset), 1890-91

The series was a financial success and most of the canvases sold within a few days of exhibition. Monet received recognition and the value of all of his work began to rise.

The series was a turning point for me too, standing in that room at The Art Institute in Chicago. For the first time, I understood the pursuit of the artist beyond the painting. There is devotion in repeatedly recording the play of light over grain stacks and the moods of the sky and the season. Bearing witness to a beauty so immense and ever changing that you could never hope to capture all of it.

Even on 25 canvases.

Claude Monet, Grainstacks at Giverny, sunset, 1888-9