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The Customs House at Varengeville

A work made of oil on canvas.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A work made of oil on canvas.

Date:

1897

Artist:

Claude Monet
French, 1840-1926

About this artwork

Claude Monet painted the customs house at Varengeville, on the Normandy coast of France, four times in 1882 and four more times in 1897. On each occasion he chose a similar vantage looking down on the small structure, which appears to grow out of the cliffside. The dimensions of this version are nearly identical to those of the other three canvases from the second visit. Here, Monet increased the amount of white in his paints to capture more nuanced atmospheric effects. He also experimented with techniques to animate the surface, at times scraping down or wiping away the still-soft paint to expose underlying colors. In the water, for example, breaks in the pale-gray paint reveal a bright green beneath, which the artist accentuated with additional touches of a similar green on top.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist

Claude Monet

Title

The Customs House at Varengeville

Place

France (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1897

Medium

Oil on canvas

Inscriptions

Inscribed, lower left: Claude Monet 97

Dimensions

65.6 × 92.8 cm (25 13/16 × 36 1/2 in.)

Credit Line

Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection

Reference Number

1933.1149

IIIF Manifest  The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.

https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/16542/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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