Claude Monet: The Steps

Claude Monet (French, 1840-1926), *L’Escalier*, painted in 1878, signed ‘Claude Monet’ (lower left) oil on canvas, 24¼ x 19¾ in. (61.4 x 50.2 cm.), Image Source: Christie’s

“In L’Escalier, Monet has selected as his subject an unprepossessing but utterly charming corner of an old farmyard. The pale stucco walls and steeply slanting, shingled roofs form a shallow succession of jostling planes, with only a narrow strip of cloud-flecked sky visible at the top of the canvas. In compositional terms, L’Escalier is anchored around a narrow set of stairs that leads the viewer’s eye into the scene, a device that Monet would reprise three years later in his celebrated views of Jean and Michel in the garden of the family’s home at Vétheuil (fig. 4). The subtle but richly nuanced palette of L’Escalier is dominated by yellow, ochre, and sepia tones, which suffuse the scene in a warm, autumnal glow. Weathered buildings and fall foliage alike are painted with the same golden hues and active, flickering touch, suggesting that the work of man and that of nature–rather than being at odds, as Monet had come to find them at Argenteuil–are harmoniously and inextricably linked in this rustic, peaceful milieu.”
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