Claude Monet, 'Woman Seated on a Bench', 1874
About the work
Overview
The sitter, who was once thought to be Monet's first wife Camille, whom he married in 1870, was in fact a professional model who also posed for other artists, including Degas.
This work was probably painted in the summer at Argenteuil. The very free handling of the paint may reflect the influence of Edouard Manet, who was working alongside Monet at the time.
Key facts
Details
- Full title
- Woman Seated on a Bench
- Artist
- Claude Monet
- Artist dates
- 1840 - 1926
- Date made
- 1874
- Medium and support
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 73.7 × 55.9 cm
- Inscription summary
- Signed
- Acquisition credit
- On loan from Tate: Presented by the Art Fund 1926
- Inventory number
- L718
- Location
- Not on display
- Image copyright
- On loan from Tate: Presented by the Art Fund 1926, © 2000 Tate
- Collection
- Main Collection
About this record
If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.
Images
More works by Claude Monet
(Showing 6 of 16 works)
During the summer of 1869, Monet and Renoir painted together at La Grenouillère, a slightly raffish resort on the river Seine some 12 kilometres west of Paris. It had become a popular weekend retreat from the city during the 1860s.Monet made several oil sketches at the resort, including this pict...
Torrential rain in autumn 1896 caused extensive flooding near Monet’s home in Giverny. The river Epte, a tributary of the Seine, burst its banks and overflowed into the meadow next to Monet’s garden.Obliged to remain close to home, Monet painted the view of the waterlogged landscape that he saw i...
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Irises were among Monet’s favourite flowers, and he cultivated many different species, planting them in both his flower garden and his water garden. This is one of approximately 20 views or irises surrounding the banks of the lily pond that Monet painted around 1914–17. It is as though we are sta...
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Monet was in his early twenties when he painted this view across the breakwaters to the headland of La Hève, near Sainte-Adresse on the Normandy coast. He knew the area well, as he had spent his childhood in nearby Le Havre. The picture was probably made on the spot as a study for a larger studio...
Not on display
Snow scenes were a particular favourite among the Impressionists, and Monet painted several canvases that explore the way sunlight plays upon the snow, reflecting tones of red, pink, purple and blue at different times of day. He produced this scene of Lavacourt, a tiny hamlet on a bend in the Sei...
On display elsewhere
In 1871 Monet moved with his family to Argenteuil, a suburb north-west of Paris. During his six-year stay there he painted around 200 pictures of the town and its surroundings. This picture is one of 18 Argenteuil canvases that record the snowy winter of 1874/5. The figures trudging along the roa...
Monet’s earlier paintings of the Normandy coast had emphasised it as a working seascape, peopled with fishermen who had to contend with a cold climate, choppy seas and stormy skies. But this painting and the eight others he made in the summer of 1870 show it as a holiday destination, with wide sa...
This painting is one of a dozen views of the Gare Saint-Lazare that Monet painted in early 1877. He had known the station since his childhood, and it was also the terminal for trains to many of the key Impressionist sites west of Paris.One of the less finished paintings of the group, it is the mo...
During the 1870s when he was living at Argenteuil, on the outskirts of Paris, Monet made several trips back to Le Havre, where he had grown up. The city was a thriving commercial and industrial centre, and France’s most important transatlantic port, with a series of harbours and busy docks. For...
In 1871 Monet settled in Argenteuil, a small suburban town on the Seine just nine kilometres and a fifteen-minute train journey from Paris. Already partially industrialised, Argenteuil was also famous as a centre for pleasure boating, and Monet was particularly attracted by its regattas and sail...
Not on display
Monet was captivated by London’s fog during his first stay in the capital from 1870 to 1871. Later in life he told the art dealer Rene Gimpel: ‘Without the fog, London would not be a beautiful city. It’s the fog that gives it its magnificent breadth.’ This misty composition is anchored by carefu...
In 1893 Monet bought a plot of land next to his house in Giverny. He had already planted a colourful flower garden, but now he wanted to create a water garden ‘both for the pleasure of the eye and for the purpose of having subjects to paint'. He enlarged the existing pond, filling it with exotic...
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In 1916 Monet had a new studio built at his home in Giverny in order to work on huge canvases of his water-lily pond, each of them more than two metres high. These monumental paintings were intended to form an entire decorative scheme, and he donated 22 of them to the French state after the Firs...
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During the final two decades of his life Monet devoted himself to painting the water garden he had created at his home in Giverny, producing around 250 innovative canvases. His paintings became increasingly experimental as he gradually abandoned depictions of the banks of the pond, its Japanese b...
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