Musée
Marmottan Monet
Musée Marmottan - Metro :
Muette - 2, rue Louis Boilly 75016 Paris
The collection of the Musée Marmottan consists largely of
paintings by Monet, bequeathed, along with the family's former
residence, a nineteenth century hotel particulier, to the
Académie des Beaux-Arts by the wealthy industrialist Jules
Marmottan and his son, art historian and collector, Paul Marmottan.
Among the paintings is Monet's Impression,
Soleil Levant, (Impression, Sunrise, 1872), a rendering of a
misty sunrise over le Havre. Its title was borrowed by critics to give
the Impressionist movement its name. In october 1985, the
painting, along with eight others, was stolen from the gallery.
After a police operation lasting five years and extending as far afield
in Japan, the paintings were discovered in a villa in southern corsica
- they're now back on show with greatly tightened security.
There's a dazzling collection of canvases from Monet's last years at
Giverny, including several Nympheas, le Pont Japonais, l'Allée
des Rosiers, and le Saule Pleureur, where rich colors are laid on in
thick, excited whorls and lines. To all intents and purposes, these are
abstractions, much more "advanced" than the work of, say, Renoir,
Monet's exact contemporary, some of whose paintings are on display, as
are those of other Impressionists, including Berthe Morisot.
