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Claude Monet
French, 1840–1926
Rouen Cathedral, the Façade in Sunlight
c. 1892–94
“What a task this cathedral is!” wrote Monet from Rouen, in a letter to his wife in Giverny. He painted nearly thirty views of the cathedral’s façade, moving from one canvas to the next to capture different moments throughout the day. After returning home, he continued to work on this series for two more years. The encrusted brushstrokes on this canvas evoke the blinding radiance of sunlight glinting off pale stone. When the painting is viewed from a distance, the cathedral’s arched doorways, rose window, and towers become clearly visible.
Image Caption
Claude Monet, Rouen Cathedral, the Façade in Sunlight, c. 1892–94, oil on canvas. Clark Art Institute, sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA Acquired in memory of Anne Strang Baxter, 1967.1
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
42 x 29 in. (106.7 x 73.7 cm)
Object Number
1967.1
Acquisition
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA. Acquired in memory of Anne Strang Baxter, 1967
Status
On View
Select Bibliography
. Art News Annual.. 1968.. . Gazette des Beaux-Arts: Chronique des Arts. Feb. 1968.. John Coplans. Serial Imagery (exh.cat.).. Pasadena Art Museum/New York Graphic Society.. 1969.. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1970. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1972. Wildenstein, Daniel. Claude Monet: Biographie et catalogue raisonné. 5 volumes. Lausanne & Paris: La Bibliothèque des Arts, 1974-1991. Art Institute of Chicago.. Paintings by Monet. March 15-May 11, 1975.. 1975.. Kramer, Hilton. "Art: Clark Institute Marks Silver Jubliee." New York Times, June11, 1980. Robert Suckale.. Claude Monet: Die Kathedrale von Rouen.. Munich: Piper Verlag.. 1981.. Brooks, John H. Highlights: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1981. Grace Seiberling.. Monet's Series.. New York: Garland.. 1981.. Faison, S. Lane, Jr. The Art Museums of New England: Massachusetts. Vol. 2. Revised edition of Faison, Guide to the Art Museums of New England, 1958. Godine Guide 3. Boston: David R. Godine, 1982. Gerdts, William H. American Impressionism. New York: Abbeville Press. 1984. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984. Charles F. Stuckey, ec.. Monet: A Retrospective.. New York: Hugh Lauter Levin/Scribner.. c. 1985.. Charles F. Stuckey, ed.. Claude Monet 1840-1926.. Cologne:Köneman/Lauter Levin.. 1985.. Brooks, John H. Monet in Massachusetts. Exhibition brochure. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1985. William E. Melin.. "Photography and the Recording Process in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.". 19:1.. Leonardo.. 1986.:pp. 53-60.. Richard Kendall, ed.. Monet by Himself: Paintings, Drawings, Pastels, Letters.. London: Macdonald Orbis.. 1989.. Dantzic, Cynthia. Design Dimensions: An Introduction to the Visual Surface. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1990. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.. Monet in the '90s: The Series Paintings. Feb. 7-April 29, 1990; Art Institute of Chicago, May 19-Aug. 12, 1990; Royal Academy of Arts, London, Sept. 7-Dec. 9, 1990. Cat. by Paul Tucker.. 1990.. Bernard Myers.. Methods of the Masters: Monet.. London: Brian Todd Publishing.. 1990.. Joachim Pissarro.. Monet's Cathedral: Rouen 1892-1894.. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.. 1990.. Martha Kapos.. The Impressionists: A Retrospective.. New York: Hugh Lauter Levin/Macmillan.. 1991.. Charles F. Stuckey, ed.. Monet: Un peintre, une vie, une oeuvre.. Paris: Belfond/Lauter Levin.. 1992.. Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992. Mark C. Taylor.. Disfiguring: Art, Architecture, Religion.. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.. 1992.. Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992. Garver, Thomas H. The Art Collection of Pleasant Company.. Privately printed.. 1993. Norris Kelly Smith.. Here I Stand: Prespective from Another Point of View.. New York: Columbia University Press.. 1994.. Martha Kapos, ed.. Impressionismus.. Cologne: Konemann Verlagsgesellschaft.. 1994.. Martha Kapos, Ed.. Impresionismo.. Cologne: Konemann Verlagsgesellschaft.. 1994.. Rouen (France): Musée des beaux-arts.. Rouen, les Cathedrales de Monet.. June 23-Nov. 14, 1994.. Paul Tucker.. Claude Monet: Life and Art.. London: Yale University Press.. 1995.. Kern, Steven, et al. The Clark: Selections from the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. New York: Hudson Hills Press, 1996. Daniel Wildenstein. Monet: Catalogue Raisonné, 4 vols. (in English, French, German).. Wildenstein Institute and Paris: Taschen France and Cologne: Benedikt Taschen Verlag.. 1996. Turner, Jane Shoaf, ed. The Dictionary of Art. 33 volumes. London: Macmillan. Anonymous. "Nineteenth-Century Painting and Sculpture." The Magazine Antiques 152 (October 1997): 522–31. Melikian, Souren. "A Unique and Unforgettable Collection." International Herald Tribune, 16–17 September 2000. Rand, Richard. "Recent Acquisitions (19942005) at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute." The Burlington Magazine 147, no. 1225 (April 2005): 293300. Fowle, Frances, ed. Monet and French Landscapes: Vétheuil and Normandy. National Galleries of scotland in association with the Visual Arts research Institute, Edinburgh. 2006. Lees, Sarah, ed. Nineteenth-Century European Paintings at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven and London: distributed by Yale University Press, 2012.
Provenance
Maurice Masson, Paris (until 1911, his sale, Drouot, Paris, 22 June 1911, no. 26, as Le portail de la cathédrale de Rouen, possibly sold to Durand-Ruel); [Durand-Ruel, Paris and New York, possibly from 1911–at least 1914]; Frank F. Nicola, Pittsburgh (in 1925); Murdock (c. 1932); Lucius D. Humphrey, New York; [Wildenstein, New York, until at least 1952]; Ramon Aspillaga, Lima (by 1956); sale, Christie’s, London, 2 Dec. 1966, no. 36, ill., as La Cathédrale de Rouen, sold to Arthur Tooth & Sons, London, as agent for the Clark; Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1966.