La colazione sull'erba

What hangs in the Orsay is a survivor, two ragged pieces of a picture that was once enormous. Monet started it in 1865, in his mid-twenties, meaning to walk into the Salon with a canvas over four metres tall showing fashionable Parisians picnicking in the forest. He ran out of time and never submitted it. Then, broke, he handed the rolled-up canvas to a landlord as security for unpaid rent, and it sat in a damp cellar until mould ate into it. Years later Monet cut out the parts still worth keeping. One panel has vanished entirely. In what remains you can see dappled sunlight coming through leaves onto the picnic cloth, the effect he would chase for the rest of his life, next to patches he simply never finished.