Under the lemon trees

Early in 1884 Monet left the grey light of Normandy and went south by himself to Bordighera, a town on the Italian Riviera just over the French border. The Mediterranean vegetation astonished him, and he kept writing to friends that no one in Paris would believe the colours, that the blues and pinks looked invented. You can see the problem he set himself here. He painted in the lemon grove at the failing end of the day, so the cool blue of the dusk has to hold its own against the hard yellow of the fruit. He stayed about three months on that trip and came home with roughly 40 canvases.