Claude Monet and Joan Mitchell: Dialogue in Saint Louis

From March 24 through June 25, 2023, the Saint Louis Art Museum (SLAM) presents “Monet/Mitchell: Painting the French Landscape”

Source: Saint Louis Art Museum · Image: Claude Monet, French, 1840–1926; “Water Lilies”, 1914-17; oil on canvas; 70 7/8 x 78 3/4 inches; Musee Marmottan Monet, Paris 2023.97; © Musee Marmottan Monet, Academie des beaux-arts, Paris

“Monet/Mitchell: Painting the French Landscape” is the first exhibition in America to examine the relationship between the paintings of two masters of their medium: the French artist Claude Monet (1840-1926) and the American artist Joan Mitchell (1925-1992). The exhibition presents 24 paintings, 12 by each artist, and will closely follow the development of Mitchell’s work from 1968 until 1992, a period when she lived in the small village of Vétheuil, France overlooking a house once inhabited by Monet. Organized in partnership with the Fondation Louis Vuitton and the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris, the exhibition adapts the Paris presentation of “Monet-Mitchell” now at the Fondation Louis Vuitton by incorporating eight different works by Mitchell and two by Monet.

In 1968, Abstract Expressionist painter Joan Mitchell moved to the small village of Vétheuil in the north of France, where she would continue to live and work for the rest of her life overlooking a house where Claude Monet had lived between 1878 and 1881. The artist, a contemporary of Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, and Philip Guston, already counted the late Impressionist amongst her influences, but it was during this time period that she most intimately shared an interest in Monet’s most enduring subject: the landscape and flora of northern France. Their gestural and energetic canvases reflect a mutual affinity with the landscape, rivers, and rolling fields of the greater Paris region.

“Monet and Mitchell fearlessly and exuberantly upended the established traditions within their medium, and it is a joy to bring their monumental paintings together for our community to experience,” said Min Jung Kim, the Barbara B. Taylor Director of the Saint Louis Art Museum. “We are thrilled to present these two artists in dialogue with one another, and thank the Fondation Louis Vuitton and the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris for their generous loans to our exhibition.”

The exhibition examines the relationship to nature of these two artists and the ways in which they addressed similar themes of trees, earth, water, and flowers, as well as the inspiration of Monet and Mitchell’s gardens at Giverny and nearby Vétheuil, respectively. The exhibition also shows how Mitchell’s compositional formats, and vibrant, gestural style took inspiration from Monet’s. Mitchell’s vivid brushstrokes, saturated colors, and depiction of sunlight create an evocative sense of memory and feeling within her paintings, which abandoned formal composition and perspective. Monet’s later works, bold and undoubtedly abstract, were defined by their lack of formality, and are revered by generations for his brilliant, unexpected use of color and capturing of fleeting light. Monumental in scale and overwhelming in impact, the works in the exhibition highlight the fascination both painters had for expansive, panoramic formats, and their shared mastery of light, color, and expressive brushwork.