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Charing Cross Bridge (overcast day), 1900

Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)
1900

Medium/Technique Oil on canvas
Dimensions 60.6 x 91.5 cm (23 7/8 x 36 in.)
Credit Line Bequest of Janet Hubbard Stevens in memory of her mother, Janet Watson Hubbard
Accession Number1978.465
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
Coal dust combined with naturally damp weather in the 19th century to create near twilit conditions in London, even at midday. Seated on the balcony of his hotel room overlooking the Thames, Monet produced thirty-five views of Charing Cross Bridge in September of 1899, using the city’s polluted atmosphere to poetic ends. Glittering reflections of yellow sunlight dapple the water through a violet fog, dissolving the bridge and distant towers of Parliament into hazy abstraction.

InscriptionsLower right: Claude Monet 1900
ProvenanceOctober 30, 1905, sold by the artist to Durand-Ruel, Paris and New York [see note 1]; January, 1907, sold by Durand-Ruel to Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Derwin Hubbard, Chicago; by descent to their daughter, Janet Hubbard (Mrs. Brooks) Stevens (b. 1904 – d. 1977), Concord, MA; 1978, bequest of Janet Hubbard Stevens to the MFA. (Accession Date: November 15, 1978)

NOTES:
[1] The provenance information given here (to 1907) was provided in a letter from Michèle Paret, Les Beaux-Arts, Paris, to Lucretia Giese of the MFA (July 28, 1970; in MFA curatorial file).