L'ospedale da campo improvvisato

In the summer of 1865 Claude Monet was out at Chailly, on the edge of the Fontainebleau forest, working on studies for a huge painting and pestering his friend Bazille to come pose for it. Then Monet hurt his leg and was stuck in bed at the inn. Bazille, who had trained as a medical student before turning to painting, rigged up a device over the bed, a can of water on ropes to drip onto the wound, and while he was at it he painted the scene. You can see the raw red gash on Monet's shin and the flat, fed-up look on his face. The two shared a studio and were at the very start of what became Impressionism. Bazille never saw it arrive; he was killed in the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, at 28.