MUSEE MARMOTTAN, Monet Impression

And now let's take a closer look at the painting that gave Impressionism its name. You might first find it interesting to learn that although the title makes you think of a painting that was completed quite quickly, Claude Monet started it in 1872, the date found on the canvas right next to his signature, but ended it the following year.

The painting depicts the stretch of sea in front of the port of Le Havre, the Normandy town overlooking the English Channel. Describing the exhibition which included the painting with an indignant tone, art critic Emile Cardon wrote: "The aim of these painters is no longer to create shapes, patterns, and expressions; they suffice simply by creating an impression, without precise lines, colors, shadows, or lights. To fulfill such an extravagant theory they fall into a senseless, absurd, grotesque muddle, which is fortunately unprecedented in art, as it is simply a negation of the most elementary rules of drawing and painting"....