|
Prior
to moving to Giverny, Claude Monet and his family lived in
several different places, notably Argenteuil
(1871 - 1878). On the right we see Renoir's painting of Monet
at work on a canvas in his Argenteuil garden.
Around
the time of the birth of Monet's second son Michel Monet,
in 1878, the family settled in Vétheuil and three years later
moved to Poissy. Finally in 1883 Monet rented a house at Giverny.
This was to be the location of the artist's famous garden.
Monet
lived in his large pink house in Giverny, Normandy, between
1883 to 1926. The house stands above a shallow valley of the
Ru, a small stream which is a tributary of the River Epte,
and had a railway running at the foot of the garden. In 1966
Monet's house and garden were left to The Académie des Beaux-Arts
by Michel Monet. Restored in the late 1970's and early 1980's
and now part of the Claude Monet Foundation, the garden has
been extensively replanted to take it back to how it was in
Monet's time, when it was regarded by Monet's contemporaries
as one of his masterpieces. The restoration was no small matter.
The house itself had no glass left in the windows, joists
and beams had rotted and a staircase collapsed. Trees were
growing in the big studio and in the garden the pond had diminished
to a shallow swamp. A copy of the original Japanese bridge
was made, for the original was also too decayed to be saved.
500,000
visitors now visit Monet's house and garden each year, but
in 1883 when the
Monet family settled in Giverny the piece of land before the
house was an orchard surrounded by stone walls. This 'Clos
Normand' of about one hectare had a central pathway running
down the center, flanked by a row of pine trees on each side.
Monet had most of the trees cut down to make way for the creation
of his garden.
In
the resulting space Monet created a series of parallel and
crossing, straight pathways, which enclosed rectangular planting
areas. It became primarily a garden of flowers, for Monet
loved flowers, and despite the geometrical structure of the
garden skeleton, plants were allowed to spread and grow in
profusion, softening edges and tumbling over boundaries, for
Monet decried too much pruning and confinement.
A
notable feature of the garden both in Monet's time and today
is the the Grand Allée, a series of wide iron arches
over the central pathway and bedecked with climbing roses.
One end of the Grand Allée is flanked by large spruce
trees. The Clos Normand flower garden also features
pillars of roses and single-colour borders. Widely known is
the water garden, which Monet bought as a separate piece of
land on the other side of the railway. The large pond was
formed by damming the stream there. We have devoted a separate
page to Monet's paintings of his water garden and water lilies
(click here). Below
we present various images of Monet's garden at Giverny (and
a few elsewhere).
-
Don't lose this page - we recommend book marking it now -
|
