I've always loved art. My grandmother, the original MaryAnn is an artist and she and my mom developed in me at a young age a love for art, specifically Impressionism. When I was a little girl, I had a book about Edgar Degas, who has since been my favorite artist. Through my adoration of Edgar and his work, I discovered other impressionists I love, included Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Claude Monet. My bedroom at home has a Monet print hanging on the wall. Our hallways are lined with paintings from my grandmother and Monet. One of the Water Lilies paintings is hanging in the Cleveland Museum of Art, an integral part of my childhood. (A picture of me looking at it is the banner of this blog!) I've known of Giverny since I was a little girl and my love for it grew when I was at my French camp and one of my classes did a unit on Normandy and we discussed Monet, Giverny, and his paintings of Étretat. To be able to go to Giverny and see those very paintings in person was the opportunity of a lifetime. I saw the original copies of several of the paintings we have at home as well as the locations that inspired the paintings was too good to be true.
We began the day with a guided tour of the museum in Giverny where there was an exhibit showcasing both Monet and Auburtin, comparing the work of the two artists and how Auburtin recreated the famous works of Monet in his own style. Our guide was incredibly knowledgable, telling us in French about how Auburtin was inspired by Monet's work and how Monet and the other impressionists adopted the name Impressionism when an art critic gave a scathing review of their work, calling it "impressions" of art based of of the title of Monet's Impression Soleil Levant (Impressionism, Sunrise) displayed at the exhibit. Rather than be discouraged, the artists embraced the description and turned it into their own style, becoming some of the most famous artists in the world. She also told us an anecdote of how, when painting in Normandy, Monet and his artwork were swept away in a wave, his canvases, paint, brushes, and all his supplied being washed away into the ocean. When he crawled himself out of the ocean on all fours, Monet discovered that his paint had turned his white beard multicolored in the water. It's hard to image such a serious looking man like Monet crawling out of the ocean with a colorful beard.
After our museum tour, we had two hours free to get lunch and walk around the town, followed by two hours in the garden and home of Monet. Even in the rain and cold weather we had this weekend, the village and gardens were stunning.
Giverny itself looks like something from a dream. The buildings are all stone cottages bustling with flowers and bushes and trees and ivy that make the entire village look green. The influence of Monet and his art on the village is evident as you walk down the main street past local art galleries, signs to his tomb, and of course his home and gardens. It's so strange to consider that if not for Monet, no one would know of Giverny. But because of him, school and travel groups walk awe-struck down the quiet stone streets of the little village the artist once called home.
Walking down the stone streets of Giverny, looking at the ivy covered homes, the flowers everywhere, and stone cottages that look like I belong in a story book, I was more content and alive than I've felt for a long time. This whole trip in general has beens something that I didn't know I needed. For a long while now, I've been living to get through specific things. "Just get through finals to summer." "Just get through these two weeks of work until you can go to Paris." "Just get through this shift at work and then you can go home." It's been a long time since I've truly lived in the moment, focusing on my breathing and feeling every part of my body and the world around me. Every day I am so thankful for the opportunity to travel and see places that I've only read about or dreamt of going.