À propos de l’œuvre
Crépuscule à Venise, par Claude Monet
Claude Monet · 1908 · Artizon Museum · W1769
Twilight in Venice W1769hand painted reproduction
San Giorgio Maggiore becomes a dark silhouette in front of an incandescent sky. The campanile rises in a turquoise zone, while the horizon burns orange and red. In the lagoon, the same colors spread in horizontal bands crossed by the vertical reflection of the tower.
Look at the work
A Venetian twilight where the sky sets the lagoon ablaze and reduces San Giorgio to a colorful silhouette
The island occupies the left of the composition and lets the sky and water open to the right. The campanile is the dominant vertical. Its off-center position avoids solemn symmetry and circulates the gaze between the monument, the red horizon and the vast lagoon.
The Artizon Museum highlights the opposition between the moving touch of the sky and the horizontal touch of water. The upper turquoise descends towards a golden yellow then an orange-red. These colors mingle in the reflection without losing the difference between the air and the liquid surface.
W1769 condenses Venice into three forces: the silhouette of San Giorgio, the fire of the sky and the lagoon which extends its colors.
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.
San Giorgio placed against the light
The facade and the monastery receive almost no direct light. However, their silhouette combines brown, purple, red and blue. The backlight must therefore remain colored and never become a uniform black cutout.
A two-month stay that became a series
Monet arrived in Venice with Alice in the fall of 1908. Seduced by the city, he extended his stay and began around thirty-seven paintings, then taken up in Giverny before their Parisian exhibition in 1912.
Two brush gestures for two elements
The museum describes touches that seem to swell and undulate in the sky, against more horizontal passages on the water. This difference in gesture gives twilight its tension and must remain visible in the copy.
Reference image
Read this specific version
The only official image available measures 800 × 629 px. It comes from the Artizon Museum, remains at its native definition and has been converted into a real WebP, without artificial enlargement.
The silhouette on the left, the open light on the right
The dark weight of the island is compensated by the bright space. The campanile connects the two halves and creates an axis for reflection.
Turquoise, gold, orange and carmine red
The gradient should not be smooth. Each area contains touches of the neighboring color, which makes the passage from the cold sky to the burning horizon vibrate.
The vertical reflection within horizontal water
The tower projects a dark strip downward, but the surface of the lagoon fragments it. The painter must preserve both this vertical and the horizontal rhythm of the small touches.
Documented benchmarks
Three pieces of information specific to this work
These landmarks concern precisely Twilight in Venice from the Artizon Museum, Wildenstein catalog 1769.
Artizon Museum, W1769
This oil on canvas from 1908 measures 73 × 92.5 cm. It is signed and dated "Claude Monet 1908" at the bottom right.
San Giorgio Maggiore at dusk
The museum identifies the church on the left and emphasizes its silhouette appearance against the light, in front of a sky that turns redder near the horizon.
Presented in Paris in 1912
The painting belongs to all the views of Venice shown at the Bernheim-Jeune gallery in 1912, after the long revivals carried out by Monet in his workshop in Giverny.
Your reproduction
What the painter must preserve
Fidelity here depends on precise relationships between light, touch, depth and color temperature.
- The Artizon Museum and Wildenstein version 1769
- The original format of 73 × 92.5 cm
- The silhouette of San Giorgio kept colorful
- The difference in gesture between the moving sky and the horizontal lagoon
Work sheet
| Title | Twilight in Venice W1769 |
|---|---|
| Artist | Claude Monet (1840 -1926) |
| Date | 1908 |
| Original technique | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 73 × 92.5 cm |
| Orientation | Horizontal |
| Conservation | Artizon Museum, Ishibashi Foundation, Tokyo, Japan |
| Inventory | Wildenstein 1769 |
| Your reproduction | Handmade oil painting on canvas |
Presentation in your interior
A palette designed with the room
Turquoise, gold, burnt orange, carmine red and deep purple give this reproduction a spectacular presence. It functions as a focal point in a living room or dining room, with a discreet dark or golden setting.
