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Valley of the Creuse (Sunlight Effect)
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
1889
Medium/Technique
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
65.1 x 92.4 cm (25 5/8 x 36 3/8 in.)
Credit Line
Juliana Cheney Edwards Collection
Accession Number25.107
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
This picture belongs to a group that Monet painted during his 1889 stay at Fresselines in the Massif Central region of France. It represents the convergence of two rivers, the Petite Creuse and the Grande Creuse, under the midday sun. Bright light casts every cranny and outcropping of rock into high relief and makes the river below sparkle with Monet’s impasted strokes of white.
InscriptionsLower left: Claude Monet 89
ProvenanceJune 20, 1889, sold by the artist to Boussod, Valadon et Cie., Paris; February 16, 1891, sold by Boussod, Valadon et Cie. to Williams and Everett, New York [see note 1]. By 1905, James F. Sutton (b. 1849 - d. 1915), New York [see note 2]; 1915, by inheritance to his widow, Florence May Sutton (b. about 1853), New York; January 17, 1917, Sutton sale, American Art Association, New York, lot 153, to Durand-Ruel, New York (stock no. 4066); February 2, 1924, sold by Durand-Ruel to Grace M. Edwards (d. 1938), Boston; 1924, her brother, Robert Jacob Edwards (d. 1924), Boston; 1925, bequest of Robert J. Edwards to the MFA. [see note 3]. (Accession Date: April 2, 1925)
NOTES:
[1] As "Les eaux semblantes (Creuse)". Getty Provenance Index, Goupil et Cie. Records, PI-number G-29409, stock book 12, no. 19919, p. 111. Also see Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue Raisonné (1996), vol. 3, p. 465, no. 1219.
[2] Lent to the "Loan Collection of Paintings by Claude Monet," Copley Society of Boston, March, 1905, cat. no. 28.
[3] Grace M. Edwards probably purchased the painting for her brother, Robert. Siblings Robert (d. 1924), Hannah (d. 1929), and Grace (d. 1938) Edwards were each collectors of art, who seemed to have had joint ownership of the objects in their possession. When Robert died, he bequeathed his collection to the MFA in memory of their mother, Juliana Cheney Edwards. In 1925, after his death, part of his collection was acquired by the Museum, and the remainder went to his sisters, with the understanding that the objects would ultimately be left to the MFA in the collection begun in memory of their mother. The collections of Hannah and Grace were left to the MFA in 1939, following Grace's death. It is not always possible to determine exactly which paintings each sibling had owned.
NOTES:
[1] As "Les eaux semblantes (Creuse)". Getty Provenance Index, Goupil et Cie. Records, PI-number G-29409, stock book 12, no. 19919, p. 111. Also see Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue Raisonné (1996), vol. 3, p. 465, no. 1219.
[2] Lent to the "Loan Collection of Paintings by Claude Monet," Copley Society of Boston, March, 1905, cat. no. 28.
[3] Grace M. Edwards probably purchased the painting for her brother, Robert. Siblings Robert (d. 1924), Hannah (d. 1929), and Grace (d. 1938) Edwards were each collectors of art, who seemed to have had joint ownership of the objects in their possession. When Robert died, he bequeathed his collection to the MFA in memory of their mother, Juliana Cheney Edwards. In 1925, after his death, part of his collection was acquired by the Museum, and the remainder went to his sisters, with the understanding that the objects would ultimately be left to the MFA in the collection begun in memory of their mother. The collections of Hannah and Grace were left to the MFA in 1939, following Grace's death. It is not always possible to determine exactly which paintings each sibling had owned.