light attracted many different artists of the most diverse character. The Impressionists were followed by the Pointillists, like Paul Signac and Henri Edmond Cross; later by the Fauvists, like André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck; and later still by Henri Matisse.
The paintings Monet completed in Antibes, and in other cities located in the Mediterranean, reflect, in contrast to his works done in northern France, a new facet of the artist’s oeuvre. One notices how deeply colour and light enraptured Monet, and it easily surmised how intensely his stay in the south would affect his later productive period.
Monet’s unbridled interest in the representation of light in all its diversity could evolve here. The time that Monet spent in southern France and northern Italy is not only based on the vast number of canvasses dedicated to these themes, which comprise a large portion of his oeuvre.
During the 1870s and 1880s, Monet spent much of his time in Brittany. In general the Breton islands were little frequented by artists of the 19th century, but Monet liked Belle-Île especially, the largest Breton island. This was the place where he sought and successfully found new landscapes and a new atmosphere.
Morning on the Seine, 1898. Oil on canvas, 73 × 91.5 cm.
The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo.
Morning on the Seine by Giverny, 1897.
Oil on canvas, 73.2 × 93 cm. Musée d’Orsay, Paris.
The rapidly changing weather conditions hindered him from painting at certain times of the day, as he usually did. Monet would also choose places that were difficult to reach.
Nevertheless, he was never deterred from painting a motif that interested him. Often he would place his canvas on the edge of a steep slope, and he would spend as much time as needed in order to bring the desired motif to life through his paintbrush. While at the Breton coast, Monet met his future biographer, Gustave Geffroy.
The island’s landscape is depicted with steep cliffs and rocky coasts, among them the rocks Port Domois and Port Coton, named ‘coton’ (cotton) after the white foam from the waves continuously crashing high against the rocks. Five paintings originate from Port Domois.
Besides painting the dangerous and sharp edges, Monet also painted the imposing heights, the sea, the tides crashing against the rock formations of the majestic coast, and the small ports and beaches of the island.
The exceptional rendition not only captures the inimitability of remarkable geology, but also of the tumultuousness of the Atlantic Ocean.
It is apparent in all the Belle-Île paintings that the highly-placed horizon leaves little room for the sky, and that the painter focused primarily on the fight between the water and the rocks. Thus, it is difficult to gauge the weather conditions of a painting, despite weather being a focal point in many of Monet’s works.
The paintings are colourful; the rocks, as much as the sea, are done in blue, green, and violet tones. The relatively dark colours generate a menacing atmosphere, an accurate rendition of the island’s character.
In comparison to the paintings The Rocks at Belle-Île (1886, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), The Port-Coton ‘Pyramids’ (1886, Gustave Rau Collection), and Rocks at Port-Coton, the Lion Rock, Belle-Île (vol. 1, p. 230), the painting Port-Domois, Belle-Île (vol. 1, p. 232) portrays a more tranquil image of the sea.
Daniel Wildenstein calls the Moscow painting Pyramids of Porte-Coton. Stormy Sea. Marine subjects play a prominent part in Monet’s œuvre.
The artist’s love of the sea was probably awakened when he lived in Le Havre, where he learned the rudiments of painting under Eugène Boudin.
Kolsaas Mountain, 1895.
Oil on canvas, 65 × 92 cm. Private collection, US.
Valley of the Creuse (Gray Day), 1889.
Oil on canvas, 65.5 × 81.2 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Heavy Sea at Pourville, 1897. Oil on canvas, 73.5 × 101 cm.
The National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo.
Monet painted seascapes all his life, but the best of them are those produced in the 1880s at Belle-Île and Étretat. In September and October 1886 the artist worked at picturesque Belle-Île and it was then, in all likelihood, that the Moscow canvas was painted. The gloom of the place invested the painting with a stern atmosphere; the colours are harsh and clashing patches of white, blue, green and brownish-violet, are applied in energetic, almost impasted strokes of varying sizes and shapes.
This dynamic handling evokes a sense of restless motion, the elements ever at work and the sea never the same. The mercurial sea is the keynote of the painting, everything else – the artist’s usual interest in the intricate play of reflected sunshine, the effects of light on colours, etc. – being less significant.
Monet was completely captivated by the stern romance of the sea and rocks. This spot was painted by Monet time and again, therefore versions of the motif are to be found in many collections in different parts of the world.
The same year, 1886, Monet portrayed the sea at Belle-Île in three other pictures, two of which are in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and one in a private collection in Copenhagen. Besides the Copenhagen painting, those depicting the cliffs of Belle-Île are also similar to the Moscow marine picture.
In Brittany he was moved by the region’s singularity and severity, writing to Durand-Ruel: “I am doing a lot of work; this place is very beautiful, but wild, yet for all that the sea is incomparable, surrounded by fantastic crags.”
As a result of his daily contact with Nature, Monet gained insight into her peculiarities, and he created landscapes in which concretely observed, unique features are combined with attempts at generalisation. One such work is the landscape The Rocks at Belle-Île (1886, Pushkin Museum, Moscow), in which he depicts the jagged, windswept crags of the Brittany coast, the white crests of the foaming water, and, beyond, the boundless sea, which seems almost to flow into the sky at the horizon.
This is indeed Brittany, but not only Brittany – it is the sea in general, its endlessness, its eternal battle with dry land. The painting is executed in varied, sensitive strokes, strictly following the form of the object portrayed – in this case, the cliffs. Monet set himself a rather different task in a landscape painted in that same year of 1886, Cliffs at Étretat (Pushkin Museum, Moscow). Here too, the viewer is presented with a wide expanse of sea, bounded to the left by the line of the shore which rises up into blue cliffs.
Val-Saint-Nicolas, near Dieppe (Morning), 1897.
Oil on canvas, 64.8 × 100 cm. The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.
Steep Cliffs near Dieppe, 1897. Oil on canvas, 65 × 100.5 cm.
The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg.
How different the treatment of these cliffs is, however! The crags are removed from the foreground, and the shoreline in front them is quite
