The Fondation Claude Monet is a nonprofit that manages the house and gardens of

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, ; ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his ...

Giverny Giverny () is a Communes of France, commune in the northern French Departments of France, department of Eure.water lilies in the pond, the Japanese bridge, and a weeping willow tree. With a total of 530,000 visitors in 2010, it is the second most visited tourist site in Normandy after the island of

Mont Saint-Michel Mont-Saint-Michel (; Norman: ''Mont Saint Miché''; ) is a tidal island and mainland commune in Normandy, France. The island lies approximately off France's north-western coast, at the mouth of the Couesnon River near Avranches and is i ...

. The house and gardens have been listed among the ''

Maisons des Illustres ''Maisons des Illustres'' is a mark of quality (French: ''label de qualité'') of buildings in France, indicating places where the purpose is to preserve the memory of people distinguished in the political, social and cultural history of France.

'' and classified as a '' Jardin Remarquable''. The estate was classified as a in 1976. Monet's paintings of the gardens, especially the sites' pond with water lilies, are exhibited in dozens of major collections.

History

lived and painted in

Giverny Giverny () is a Communes of France, commune in the northern French Departments of France, department of Eure.Epte The Epte () is a river in Seine-Maritime and Eure, in Normandy, France. It is a right tributary of the Seine, long. The river rises in Seine-Maritime in the Pays de Bray, near Forges-les-Eaux, and empties into the Seine not far from Giverny. O ...

partially diverted for the gardens and hired up to seven gardeners to tend to it. Monet gained much of his inspiration from his gardens and believed it was important to surround himself with nature and paint outdoors. When Monet died in 1926, the entire estate was passed on to his younger son Michel. As he never spent time in Giverny, it was left to

Blanche Hoschedé Monet Blanche Hoschedé Monet (10 November 1865 – 8 December 1947) was a French Painting, painter who was both the stepdaughter and the daughter-in-law of Claude Monet. Early life Ernest and Alice Hoschedé Blanche Hoschedé was born in Paris ...

, the daughter of Monet’s second wife

Alice Alice may refer to: * Alice (name), most often a feminine given name, but also used as a surname Literature * Alice (''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''), a character in books by Lewis Carroll * ''Alice'' series, children's and teen books by ...

and widow of his elder son,

Jean Jean may refer to: People * Jean (female given name) * Jean (male given name) * Jean (surname) Fictional characters * Jean Grey, a Marvel Comics character * Jean Valjean, fictional character in novel ''Les Misérables'' and its adaptations * J ...

, to look after the garden with the help of former head gardener Louis Lebret. After Blanche died in 1947, the garden was left untended.

Michel Monet Michel Monet (17 March 1878 – 3 February 1966) was the second son of Claude Monet and Camille Doncieux Monet. Early life Born on 17 March 1878, 26 rue d'Édimbourg, in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, where the Monets had moved from Argenteui ...

died heirless in a car crash in 1966. He had bequeathed the estate to the

Académie des beaux-arts The (; ) is a French learned society based in Paris. It is one of the five academies of the . The current president of the academy (2021) is Alain-Charles Perrot, a French architect. Background The academy was created in 1816 in Paris as a me ...

. From 1977 onwards, Gérald Van der Kemp, then curator at the

Palace of Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; ) is a former royal residence commissioned by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, Yvelines, Versailles, about west of Paris, in the Yvelines, Yvelines Department of Île-de-France, Île-de-France region in Franc ...

, and his wife Florence played a key role in the restoration of the neglected house and gardens. In a bid to raise funds, the couple appealed to American donors through the "Versailles Foundation-Giverny Inc.". Substantial work needed to be done; the floors and ceiling beams were rotting while a staircase had already collapsed. Most of the window panes in both the greenhouse and main house had shattered long ago, and three large trees had begun to grow in the studio.

Walter Annenberg Walter Hubert Annenberg (March 13, 1908 – October 1, 2002) was an American businessman, investor, philanthropist, and diplomat. Annenberg owned and operated Triangle Publications, which included ownership of ''The Philadelphia Inquirer' ...

, an American philanthropist that owned

Triangle Publications Triangle Publications Inc. was an American media group based first in Philadelphia, and later in Radnor, Pennsylvania. It was a privately held corporation, with the majority of its stock owned by Walter Annenberg and his sisters. Its holdings ...

, funded an underpass for easier access to the water garden so that guests would no longer have to go across a busy road. The ''Fondation Claude Monet'' was created in 1980 as the estate was declared public. It soon became very successful, and now welcomes both French and international visitors from April to November. When Gérald Van der Kemp died in 2001, Florence became the curator of the Fondation Monet and continued renovating the property until her death in 2008.

Hugues Gall Hugues Randolph Gall (; 18 March 1940 – 25 May 2024) was a French opera manager who was head of the Grand Théâtre de Genève and the Paris Opera. He was director of the Fondation Monet in Giverny from 2008, and held many influential position ...

was appointed Director of the Fondation by the Académie des beaux-arts in March 2008. As one of the most visited tourist destinations in France, strategies around ensuring long term protection for the garden are observed as a matter of protocol.

Restoration and donations

Americans donated almost all of the $7 million needed to restore Monet's home and gardens at Giverny in the 1970s. These donations were part of American diplomacy to France since "France lacked the American tradition of private giving as well as the tax concessions that encourage it." Starting in 1969, under U.S. President Richard M. Nixon, Americans could claim tax deductions for their contributions to charities. Nixon encouraged Americans to donate to France. "I felt that encouraging Americans to contribute to the heritage of France, one of our oldest allies, would be one way to remind ourselves that the past in many ways is infinitely more important than the present." For his service, Nixon was inducted into the Academie des Beaux-Arts as one of the 15 foreign members, following former President Dwight D. Eisenhower's induction in 1952. The next ten years were spent restoring the garden and the house to their former state. Not much was left after the second World War. "The greenhouse panes and the windows in the house were reduced to shards after the bombings. Floors and ceiling beams had rotted away, a staircase had collapsed. Three trees were even growing in the big studio. The pond had to be dug again. In the Clos normand, soil was removed to find the original ground level. Then the same flower species as those discovered by Monet in his time were planted." British gardener James Priest, who has been in charge of restorations made to Monet's garden, taught himself the ways of the painter, particularly Monet's watercoloring. In 2014 Priest reported that although the garden was disfigured by some previous gardeners and is worn-down from time, it is still beautiful and has potential. He says that the lily-ponds remained in a similar state, and need restoration in Monet's color palette in returning the graded cool tones to the flower beds.

House

Visitors have access to: * The ground floor: the blue salon (the reading room), the "épicerie" (the larder), the living room/studio, the dining room and the blue-tiled kitchen. * The first floor: the family rooms, including Monet's which was renovated in March 2013 as well as

Alice Hoschedé Alice Raingo Hoschedé Monet (February 19, 1844 – May 19, 1911) was the wife of department store magnate and art collector Ernest HoschedéBlanche Hoschedé, which was recreated in 2013 based on archives and existing elements present in the house. * The studio next to the home, where Monet painted his large ''Water Lilies'' paintings and murals, including those exhibited in Paris'

Musée de l'Orangerie The Musée de l'Orangerie () is an art gallery of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings located in the west corner of the Tuileries Garden next to the Place de la Concorde in Paris. The museum is most famous as the permanent home of ...

. This studio is now the Foundation's gift shop.

Gardens

The Gardens are divided into two distinctive parts, which have been restored according to Monet's own specifications, the formal Clos-Normand and the water garden with the water lilies pond and a Japanese bridge. The Clos-Normand was modelled after Monet's own artistic vision when he settled in Giverny. He spent years transforming the garden into a living ''en plein air'' painting, planting thousands of flowers in straight-lined patterns. In 1893 Monet acquired a vacant piece of land across the road from the Clos-Normand which he then transformed into a water garden by diverting water from the stream ''Ru'', an arm of the

Epte The Epte () is a river in Seine-Maritime and Eure, in Normandy, France. It is a right tributary of the Seine, long. The river rises in Seine-Maritime in the Pays de Bray, near Forges-les-Eaux, and empties into the Seine not far from Giverny. O ...

river. That garden became famous during his lifetime with his series of monumental paintings of its water lilies, the ''Nymphéas''. The water garden is marked by Monet's fascination for

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, with its green Japanese bridge and oriental plants. The now famous

water lilies ''Water Lilies'' ( ) is a series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionist Claude Monet (1840–1926). The paintings depict his flower garden at his home in Giverny, and were the main focus of his artistic production during ...

were meticulously tended by a gardener employed for that sole purpose.

Representations of the garden by Claude Monet

Claude Monet - Peony Garden - Google Art Project.jpg, ''Jardin de pivoines'', 1887,

National Museum of Western Art The is the premier public art gallery in Japan specializing in art from the Western tradition. The museum is in the Ueno Park in Taitō, central Tokyo. It received 1,162,345 visitors in 2016. History The NMWA was established on June 10, 1959 ...

(

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

) Monet - Im Garten - 1895.jpeg, ''Dans le jardin'', 1895, Fondation et Collection Emil G. Bührle (

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

) File:The Water-Lily Pond - Google Arts & Culture.jpg, ''Water Lilies and the Japanese Bridge'', 1897–1899,

Princeton University Art Museum The Princeton University Art Museum (PUAM) is the Princeton University gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. With a collecting history that began in 1755, the museum was formally established in 1882, and now houses over 117,000 work ...

Monet - Monets Garten in Giverny.jpg, ''

Le Jardin de l'artiste à Giverny ''The Artist's Garden at Giverny'' (French: ''Le Jardin de l'artiste à Giverny'') is an oil on canvas painting by Claude Monet done in 1900, now in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris. It is one of many works by the artist of his garden at Giverny over ...

'', 1900,

Musée d'Orsay The Musée d'Orsay ( , , ) () is a museum in Paris, France, on the Rive Gauche, Left Bank of the Seine. It is housed in the former Gare d'Orsay, a Beaux-Arts architecture, Beaux-Arts railway station built from 1898 to 1900. The museum holds mai ...

, (

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

) Claude Monet 056.jpg, ''Le Jardin de l'artiste à Giverny'', 1900,

Yale University Art Gallery The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is an art museum in New Haven, Connecticut. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University. Although it embraces all cultures and period ...

, (

New Haven New Haven is a city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound. With a population of 135,081 as determined by the 2020 U.S. census, New Haven is the third largest city in Co ...

) The Garden in Flower Claude Oscar Monet 1900.jpg, ''Le Jardin en fleurs'', 1900 Claude Monet, La grande allée à Giverny (1900).jpg, ''La Grande allée à Giverny'', 1900,

Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square Mile stretch of Sherbrooke Street west. The MMFA ...

File:Monet - Seerosen 1906.jpg, ''Water Lilies'', 1906,

Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the United States. The museum is based in the Art Institute of Chicago Building in Chicago's Grant Park (Chicago), Grant Park. Its collection, stewa ...

Claude Monet - Flowering Arches, Giverny.JPG, ''Les Arceaux fleuris, Giverny'', 1913,

Phoenix Art Museum The Phoenix Art Museum is the largest art museum, museum for visual art in the southwest United States. Located in Phoenix, Arizona, the museum is . It displays international exhibitions alongside its comprehensive collection of more than 18,0 ...

, Phoenix Claude Monet - Yellow Irises - Google Art Project.jpg, ''Iris jaunes'', 1914,

(Tokyo) WLA metmuseum The Path through the Irises by Claude Monet.jpg, ''Le Chemin à travers les iris'', 1914,

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

(

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

) 1914-26 Claude Monet Agapanthus MOMA NY anagoria.JPG, ''Les Agapanthes'', 1914,

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

, (New York) Monet - Das Haus in den Rosen.jpeg, ''La Maison à travers les roses'', 1917,

Albertina The Albertina is a museum in the Innere Stadt (First District) of Vienna, Austria. It houses one of the largest and most important print rooms in the world with approximately 65,000 drawings and approximately 1 million old master prints, as well ...

, (

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

) Claude Monet, Weeping Willow.JPG, ''

Weeping Willow ''Salix babylonica'' (Babylon willow or weeping willow; ) is a species of willow native to dry areas of northern China, Korea, Mongolia, Japan, and Siberia but cultivated for millennia elsewhere in Asia, being traded along the Silk Road to southw ...

'', 1918,

Columbus Museum of Art The Columbus Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in downtown Columbus, Ohio. Formed in 1878 as the Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts (its name until 1978), it was the first art museum to register its charter with the state of Ohio. The museum collec ...

Monet- Der Rosenweg in Giverny.jpeg, ''Le Chemin de roses à Giverny'', 1920, Musée Marmottan (Paris) Claude Monet - House among the Roses, the (1925).jpg, ''La Maison entre les roses'', 1925,

Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum The Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum (, ; named after its founder, Baron Heinrich Thyssen, Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza), or simply the Thyssen, is an art museum in Madrid, Spain, located near the Museo del Prado, Prado Museum on one of the city ...

(

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

) Claude Monet - Wisteria - Google Art Project.jpg, ''Glycine'', 1925,

Gemeentemuseum Den Haag The Kunstmuseum Den Haag is an art museum in The Hague in the Netherlands, founded in 1866 as the Museum voor Moderne Kunst. Later, until 1998, it was known as Haags Gemeentemuseum, and until the end of September 2019 as Gemeentemuseum Den Haag. I ...

(

The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

)

The Japanese prints collection

The majority of Monet's paintings are kept in the

Musée Marmottan Monet Musée Marmottan Monet () is an art museum in Paris, France, dedicated to artist Claude Monet. The collection features over three hundred Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings by Claude Monet, including his 1872 ''Impression, Sunrise''. ...

. However, Monet's house is home to a collection of more than 200 Japanese ukiyo-e prints from the 18th and 19th centuries. Among the most notable pieces are works by Kitagawa

Utamaro was a Japanese artist. He is one of the most highly regarded designers of ukiyo-e woodblock prints and paintings, and is best known for his ''Bijin-ga, bijin ōkubi-e'' "large-headed pictures of beautiful women" of the 1790s. He also produ ...

(1753–1806), Katsushika

Hokusai , known mononymously as Hokusai, was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the Edo period, active as a painter and printmaker. His woodblock printing in Japan, woodblock print series ''Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji'' includes the iconic print ''The Gr ...

(1760–1849) and Utagawa

Hiroshige or , born Andō Tokutarō (; 1797 – 12 October 1858), was a Japanese ''ukiyo-e'' artist, considered the last great master of that tradition. Hiroshige is best known for his horizontal-format landscape series '' The Fifty-three Stations ...

(1797–1858).

In popular culture

Much of the 2006 BBC docudrama ''

The Impressionists Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

'', which is told from Claude Monet's viewpoint, was filmed at the home, gardens, and pond.

References

Bibliography

* Claire Joyes, ''Claude Monet à Giverny, la visite et la mémoire des lieux'', Éditions Claude Monet/Gourcuff/Gradenigo, 2010, *

Hélène Rochette Hélène Rochette is a Québécois artist in visual arts oriented towards the field of sculpture. In 1982, she obtained a bachelor's degree in visual arts from the Université Laval in the City of Québec. She created several public art pieces, ...

, ''Maisons d'écrivains et d'artistes. Paris et ses alentours'', pp. 224–229, Parigramme, Paris, 2004,

External links

Fondation Monet website

''Monet's Years at Giverny: Beyond Impressionism''
exhibition catalog fully online as PDF from The Metropolitan Museum of Art {{coord, 49.0750, N, 1.5356, E, source:wikidata, display=title Monet, Giverny

Giverny Giverny () is a Communes of France, commune in the northern French Departments of France, department of Eure.Biographical museums in France Monet, Giverny Gardens in France Garden museums Japanese gardens

Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, ; ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his ...

Maisons des Illustres Open-air museums in France