Effetto di neve a Vétheuil

Monet moved his family to the village of Vetheuil on the Seine in 1878, broke and out of fashion, and stayed a little over three years. He painted the place over and over, in every season and every kind of weather. This is the village under snow, done with a thin, muted palette and quick strokes that let the whole scene dissolve into cold haze. These were hard years for him. Money was short, and his wife Camille was gravely ill and died at Vetheuil in the autumn of 1879. The snow pictures from here carry a stillness and emptiness that his sunnier riverscapes do not. When a fierce winter froze the Seine solid, Monet went out to paint the ice as it broke up.