August 31, 2020: Titled ‘Monet and Chicago’, the Art Institute of Chicago will be presenting a special exhibition of the world renowned French painter Claude Monet. Known as the Father of Impressionism, the exhibition honors the painter’s connection with Chicago.
This interrelation started when Chicago-based business and philanthropist couple Bertha and Potter Palmer acquired 20 paintings by Monet in 1891 and influenced several private collectors. The Art Institute of Chicago hosted the artist’s first solo collection called 20 Works by Claude Monet in the United States in the year 1895. It featured the Apple Trees in Blossom (1872) purchased by the Union League Club of Chicago. The Institute’s 1995 exhibition Claude Monet: 1840–1926 broke all the previous attendance and sales records. A detailed research for each one of the projects has been compiled in the Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, a groundbreaking digital scholarly catalogue published in the year 2014.
The latest exhibition Monet and Chicago offers meaningful insights into the painter’s extraordinary techniques and materials, which will help viewers understand Monet’s creative process. Seventy artworks from the institute’s holdings as well as Chicago-based collections, comprising a diverse range of paintings from still lifes, landscapes, early caricatures made at Le Havre to the last spectacular canvases inspired by his garden and water lily pond at Giverny, will be on display for this exhibition. The Art Institute of Chicago has redesigned a powerful and intimate experience while promoting social distancing. The exhibition will have a virtual line upon arrival in the museum.
More information on member access and general admission is available on the Institute’s website.