Water Lilies

History

In 1893 Monet bought land beside his house at Giverny and dug a pond for water lilies, and he spent much of his last thirty years painting it. This canvas is one of about 250 of the pond. There is no bank and no sky, only lilies floating among reflected clouds, so the water fills the whole picture. He worked on several canvases at once and moved from one to the next as the light changed. It came to the Art Institute of Chicago in 1933 with the collection of Martin A. Ryerson.