Displaying items by tag: monet and the seine: impressions of a river

In simplest terms, “Monet and the Seine: Impressions of a River,” the exhibit that opens Sunday at the Philbrook Museum of Art, is a show of only 17 paintings.

But it’s the sixth painting that one encounters in the course of moving through this exhibit that makes one realize that this seemingly modest show is something quite extraordinary.

The painting in question is “The Breaking of the Ice,” and it is, in itself, something of an anomaly. The winter of 1879 was one of the coldest on record, causing the Seine River to ice up completely.

“I have painted the Seine throughout my life, at every hour, at every season,” Claude Monet once said. “I have never tired of it: for me the Seine is always new.” In October 2014, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, will present Monet and the Seine: Impressions of a River, an exhibition that chronicles Monet’s abiding fascination with the iconic French waterway. A selection of 52 paintings by the Impressionist painter will be displayed, beginning with scenes of leisure activities, modern life and cityscapes along the Seine River and culminating in the ethereal works from the famous Mornings on the Seine series (1896–97). Monet and the Seine will be on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, from October 26, 2014, to February 1, 2015.

Monet and the Seine: Impressions of a River has been co-curated by Helga Aurisch, curator of European Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and Tanya Paul, Isabel and Alfred Bader Curator of European Art, Milwaukee Art Museum, to examine Monet’s attachment to the Seine by tracing his life along the river, both chronologically and geographically.