Rouen Cathedral, West Façade, Sunlight

Monet painted Rouen Cathedral, West Façade, Sunlight in 1894, during the second of two campaigns in Rouen, the capital of Normandy. He had begun the series in the winter of 1892-93, painting the west façade of the Gothic cathedral from a window across the street. He returned to Rouen in January 1894, renting the same window, and continued working through the spring. By the time he finished, he had produced 30 paintings of the cathedral, showing it at different times of day, in different weather, and in different light conditions. The painting shows the west façade of Rouen Cathedral in full sunlight. The façade fills the canvas, from the bottom to the top, with the main portal, the rose window, and the flanking towers all visible. The stone is painted in warm tones of cream, gold, and pink, with the shadows described in cool blues and lavenders. The sky is a narrow band of pale blue at the top of the canvas. The composition is vertical and frontal, with the viewer looking straight at the façade, as if standing in the street. Monet painted the Rouen Cathedral series from a second-floor window across the street from the cathedral, in a shop owned by a tailor named M. Louvet. He worked on several canvases simultaneously, moving from one to another as the light changed. Each canvas was painted at a specific time of day: one for the morning light, one for the noon light, one for the afternoon light, and one for the evening light. The series was Monet's most ambitious project to date, and it established the method he would use for the rest of his career: the same subject observed under different conditions of light and atmosphere. The paintings were not finished on site. Monet brought them back to his studio at Giverny and worked on them for months, adjusting the colors and the surfaces until they matched his memory of the light. He wrote to his wife Alice that he was 'working on the cathedrals, which are driving me crazy.' The reworking gave the paintings a dense, richly worked surface that is different from the fresh, spontaneous quality of his earlier Impressionist work. The Rouen Cathedral series marks a shift in Monet's practice, from painting directly from nature to painting in the studio from memory and from studies. The series was exhibited at the gallery of Monet's dealer Paul Durand-Ruel in 1895, where it was seen by the critic Georges Clemenceau, who later became the prime minister of France. Clemenceau bought one of the paintings and wrote a review that called the series 'the most revolutionary expression of the Impressionist idea.' The series was also admired by the younger generation of painters, including Matisse and the Fauves, who saw in Monet's use of color a model for their own experiments. Oil on canvas, 107 by 73 centimeters. Monet painted the façade in thick, overlapping strokes of warm and cool tones, with the stone described by the color relationships rather than by drawing. The portal and the rose window are suggested by the arrangement of the strokes, not by outline. The surface has a dense, encrusted quality, with layers of paint built up over many sessions. The colors are warm and luminous, with the cream and gold of the sunlit stone contrasting with the blue and lavender of the shadows. The vertical format and warm palette make this print work well in a living room, dining room, or hallway. The creams, golds, and warm earth tones pair with white walls, natural wood, and rooms with a traditional or elegant mood. The 16x20 or 18x24 size gives the façade room to read. The painting has a luminous, architectural quality that suits rooms with a formal or contemplative mood. The painting entered the National Gallery of Art in Washington as part of the Chester Dale Collection. It is one of several paintings from the Rouen Cathedral series in American museums. This is a public domain artwork, from the National Gallery of Art, Washington. The image is released under Creative Commons Zero (CC0). We print it on archival matte paper at sizes from 8x10 to 18x24 inches, framed or unframed. The image is printed at full resolution with no cropping.