Haystacks (Midday) — Claude Monet
The father of impressionism found a source of luminous study in the French countryside.
Monet is undoubtedly one of the great innovators in the history of painting. This artist knew how to experiment beyond what was established and decided to search for the purest germ of artistic expression.
In his search for the most primitive vision possible, Monet worked tirelessly with light and how it affects the effects and colors of the world.
This painting, Haystacks (Midday), is the first of a series of works Monet produced over several months, beginning in 1890. These are a series of prints of the same visual subject matter but which explore how daylight at different times of day affects objects.
Monet places at the center of this series of paintings the Haystacks (meules in French), agricultural structures symbolic of the countryside of Normandy in France.
They effectively store wheat, which could be kept orderly until the straw and stalk were in optimal conditions to be separated.
