The Doge's Palace by Monet in the Brooklyn Museum, March 2010

The Doge's Palace (Le Palais ducal)

Daunted by Venice’s innumerable picturesque views and art-historical legacy, Monet delayed visiting the city until 1908. Once there, he explored familiar artistic concerns—reflection, atmosphere, and structure— through the city’s fundamental visual elements: its water, light, and architecture. To capture the Doge’s Palace, one of Venice’s most notable monuments, Monet positioned himself across an expanse of water, in a gondola. Despite the horizontal format of the canvas, and of the palace itself, the painter accentuated the vertical through reflection, dissolving the solid structure into a shimmer of pink, green, and yellow. Although Monet spent several sessions painting directly in front of his subject, he reworked this canvas in his Giverny studio in preparation for a 1912 exhibition.

Artist: Claude Monet, French, 1840-1926

Medium: Oil on canvas

Place Made: Europe

Dates: 1908

Dimensions: 32 x 39 in. (81.3 x 99.1cm) Frame: 40 1/4 x 48 x 4 1/2 in. (102.2 x 121.9 x 11.4 cm)

Signature: Signed and dated lower right: "Claude Monet 1908"

Collections: European Art

Museum Location: This item is on view in Beaux-Arts Court, South, 3rd Floor

Accession Number: 20.634

Credit Line: Gift of A. Augustus Healy

Text from: www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/4377/The_Do...