Nymphéas [Waterlilies]

A photograph taken in the summer of 1915 shows Monet beside the pond, perched on a high stool and shaded by an enormous umbrella, at work on one of these large studies, which is now in the Portland Art Museum, Oregon. The Duc de Trévise also saw some of these studies when he visited Monet in 1920: He shows me vast and disconcerting studies, made for his purpose on the site during these last summers; skeins of related hues which no other eye had unravelled, bizarre assortments of incorporeal threads, thanks to which the artist possesses the [colour] scale of every atmosphere. The fresh, spontaneous brushstrokes of the Gallery's painting, and its particularity of observation, including some unusual, almost obtrusive compositional features, suggest that it was at least begun in front of the motif.