About this artwork

The complementary colours orange and blue enrich the solid forms and cast shadows of the grainstacks in the snow. They stood in a field just to the west of Monet's house in Giverny, where he established his famous water lily gardens. Monet persuaded the local farmer to leave the stacks for the autumn and relatively mild winter of 1890 so that he could paint a series of pictures. He combined work out-of-doors with some in the studio and produced at least thirty paintings of grainstacks in different lights. Their lyrical, almost abstract, quality influenced many later artists.

Updated February 2024

  • artist:
    Claude Monet (1840 - 1926) French
  • title:
    Grainstacks: Snow Effect
  • date created:
    1891
  • materials:
    Oil on canvas
  • measurements:
    65.00 x 92.00 cm; Framed: 85.00 x 111.70 x 9.00 cm / 19.00 kg
  • object type:
  • credit line:
    Bequest of Sir Alexander Maitland 1965
  • accession number:
    NG 2283
  • gallery:
  • subject:
  • glossary:
  • artwork photographed by:
    Antonia Reeve
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Claude Monet

Claude Monet