In barca sull'Epte

By 1890 Monet had settled for good at Giverny, and the little River Epte ran right along the edge of his land. That summer he kept painting the same stretch of water, with his two stepdaughters, Suzanne and Blanche, drifting in a canoe. Here he cuts the boat off at the edge of the canvas and lets the girls blur, the way a snapshot catches people mid-motion. He had been looking hard at photographs and at Japanese prints, both of which framed things like this. Most of the picture is simply the river: green reflections, the pull of the current, the surface and the depth of it at once.