À propos de l’œuvre
Saule pleureur, par Claude Monet
Claude Monet · 1918 -1919 · Kimbell AP 1996.02 · W1876
Weeping Willow, Kimbell W1876hand painted reproduction
A red trunk divides in the center before bearing a crown of gnarled branches. Around it, yellow-green curtains descend to a strip of clear water, while the left remains buried in blues and purples. Painted during the last years of the First World War, this Weeping Willow combines the presence of a precise Giverny tree with an exceptionally free and expressive material.
Look at the work
The red trunk shares a dark garden between mourning and breakthroughs of yellow light
The structure of the tree appears in fragments. The trunk rises from below in reds, pinks and purple-brown, then divides into branches that turn to the right. The foliage does not evenly fill the space: on the left, the blue-green touches compact; on the right, yellow and orange pierce between the branches and open a brighter area.
The bottom of the canvas brings together horizontal green, white, red and black marks. They can be read like the bank, the water and the roots, but Monet refuses any clear separation. Several layers overlap, some thick and knotted, others fluid like a glacis. The viewer recognizes the willow while following the material history of each cover.
The violence of the branches never erases the observation of the garden: it gives the real tree the emotional weight of a living monument.
Composition, touch and light
What Monet builds behind the impression of snapshot
Three precise elements allow us to understand this composition and the essential difficulties of faithful reproduction.
A trunk reconstructed by colored covers
Red, pink, orange, purple and green overlap in the trunk. The shape depends on these temperature changes more than on a continuous contour.
A cold left opposed to a hot right
The Kimbell observed unifying washes that were colder on the left and warmer on the right. Maintaining this seesaw gives the composition its luminous movement.
Painted surfaces, scraped then covered
Monet sometimes works wet on wet, sometimes on a dry layer, and scratches certain areas of foliage. Faithful reproduction must vary the thickness and allow the lower layers to breathe.
Details and visual documents
Observe the material and the exact version
The additional images show the difficult-to-read passages in the full view and, where it exists, the actual appearance of the work at the museum.
High definition scanning measures 3,600 × 2,991 px. Both native details measure 1,500 × 1,900 px and 1,700 × 1,500 px. No files have been artificially enlarged; all three media were encoded and controlled as true WebPs.
Documented benchmarks
Three pieces of information specific to this work
These facts concern this precise version and are verified from the notice of the institution which keeps it.
Kimbell AP 1996.02, Wildenstein 1876
The Kimbell Art Museum dates this Weeping Willow from 1918 -1919, indicates an oil on canvas of 99.7 × 120 cm and records it under the number AP 1996.02. The work corresponds to number 1876 of the Wildenstein catalog raisonné.
Ten Weeping Willows painted before 1919
The museum links this series to the mourning caused by the First World War. The Giverny estate had emptied, Monet's son was at the front and the artist sometimes heard the artillery, but he refused to leave his garden.
From Kojiro Matsukata to David Rockefeller
The painting belonged to Kôjiro Matsukata in 1924, was sequestered in France in 1944 then sold in 1947. It went through Sam Salz and the David Rockefeller collection before its acquisition by the Kimbell Art Museum in 1996.
Your reproduction
What the painter must preserve
Fidelity here depends on precise relationships between light, touch, depth and color temperature.
- The exact version of the Kimbell Art Museum, AP 1996.02 and W1876
- The original horizontal ratio of 99.7 × 120 cm
- The transition from the cold side on the left to the warm light on the right
- The thicknesses, scrapings and washes differentiated around the trunk
Work sheet
| Title | Weeping Willow, Kimbell W1876 |
|---|---|
| Artist | Claude Monet (1840 -1926) |
| Date | 1918 - 1919 |
| Original technique | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 99.7 × 120 cm |
| Orientation | Horizontal |
| Conservation | Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, United States |
| Inventory | AP 1996.02 · Wildenstein 1876 |
| Your reproduction | Handmade oil painting on canvas |
Presentation in your interior
A palette designed with the room
Forest green, acid yellow, earth red, deep purple and petroleum blue give this reproduction a dark and contemporary energy. It matches dark wood, leather, mineral walls and side light that reveals variations in material.
