The Water-Lily Pond

The Tate Gallery bought this canvas in 1927, the year after Monet died, and paid for it partly in kind. It gave the London dealers a painting by Sisley in exchange, plus 1,000 pounds from the textile industrialist Samuel Courtauld, then funding modern French pictures for the nation. The painting itself dates from 1899, when the water garden at Giverny was still young. Over the rest of his life it gave Monet about 250 canvases. Here the arched footbridge spans the whole width and is cut off at both edges, so it seems to float. You look up at the bridge and down at the lilies at once, while the willows drop their reflections in long vertical strokes between the pads. The picture moved from the Tate to the National Gallery in 1961.