Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
1865
Claude Monet (French, 1840-1926)
On View

In 1865, a twenty-four-year-old Claude Monet made his Salon debut with this picture and its pendant (today in the Kimbell Art Museum), declaring an allegiance to Courbet, Manet, and the Realist avant-garde. We stand on a jetty looking across the harbor at Honfleur, a town on the Normandy Coast where the Seine empties into the English Channel. The sails of fishing boats swell with a wind that stiffens waves in the foreground and sends clouds rolling across the sky. For all its salty immediacy, the picture was painted not outdoors—en plein air—but back in Monet’s Paris studio, on the basis of sketches he had made on-site.

Details

  • Artist Name: Claude Monet (French, 1840-1926)
  • Title: Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur
  • Date: 1865
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 35-1/4 x 59-1/4 in. (89.5 x 150.5 cm)
  • Credit Line: The Norton Simon Foundation
  • Accession Number: F.1973.33.2.P
  • Copyright: © The Norton Simon Foundation

Object Information

The artist, sold 1865 for Ff 300 to;
Alfred Cadart, Paris.
Rousselle, sold 24 July 1922 to;
[Bernheim-Jeune, Paris, stock no. 23.095, sold 28 September 1922 to];
Georges Bernheim, Paris, still in 1924, possibly 1926.
Y. de Saint-Albin, Paris;
Jacques de Saint-Albin, Paris, by 1959.
Remond, Geneva.
[Wildenstein & Co., Inc., New York, by 1968, sold 1973 to];
The Norton Simon Foundation.

  • Paris, Salon, to
  • Duret, Théodore, Die Impressionisten, p. 19
  • Bortolatto, Luigina Rossi, L'opera completa di Claude Monet,no. 8 p. 88
  • Masterpieces from the Norton Simon Museum,1989, p. 128
  • Skeggs, Douglas, River of Light: Monet's Impressions of the Seine, pp. 24-25
  • Malingue, Maurice, Claude Monet, p. 15
  • Mathey, François, The Impressionists, pp. 50, 63, 66
  • Lanöe-Villène, Georges, Histoire de l'École Française de Paysage depuis Chintreuil jusqu' à 1900, p. 280
  • Czymmek, Götz, Dossier de l'Art, p. 62
  • Gordon, Robert; and Andrew Forge, Monet, pp. 15-17
  • Léger, Charles, Claude Monet, p. 6
  • Stoll, Robert Thomas, La peinture impressionniste, p. 40
  • McKendry, Meredith - Editor, Monet: Impression Sunrise,2019, pp. 41-42; p. 42 (ill.)
  • Mantz, Paul, Le Temps, p. 3
  • Ina Conzen, Manet and the Impressionists,fig. 37 p. 41
  • Mauclair, Camille, Claude Monet, p. 6
  • Bortolatto, Luigina Rossi ;and Janine Bailly-Herzberg, Tout l'oeuvre peint de Monet 1870-1889,no. 8 p. 88
  • Rewald, John, The History of Impressionism,n. 40 pp. 122, 137
  • Mathey, François, Les Impressionnistes et leur temps, p. 72
  • Bazin, Germain, L'époque impressionniste avec notices biographiques et bibliographiques, p. 10
  • Gimpel, René, Journal d'un collectionneur, marchand de tableaux, pp. 253-254
  • Duret, Théodore, Histoire des peintres impressionnistes, pp. 95, 101
  • Stuckey, Charles F., Claude Monet, 1840-1926,1995, p. 190
  • Bernard, Bruce, The Impressionists, p. 17
  • Lathom, Xenia, Claude Monet, p. 47
  • Monet, Claude, Art News Annual, p. 198
  • Ortrud Westheider & Michael Philipp (Editors), Monet: Places,2020, fig. 4 p. 25 ; p. [24] (ill.)
  • Le Roux, H., Gil Blas, p. 2
  • Brenneman, David A., Monet: A View from the River,fig. 14 p. 31
  • Fels, Florent, Claude Monet, p. 2
  • Isaacson, Joel, Monet: Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe,p. 98, n. 8; p. 102, n. 29 pp. 20, 98, 102
  • Steadman, David W., The Connoisseur,fig. 1 pp. 220-222
  • Levine, Steven Z., Monet, Narcissus, and Self-Reflection: The Modernist Myth of Self,fig. 5 p. 4
  • Reuterswärd, Oscar, Monet: En konstnärshistorik,fig. 1 pp. 28, 30-31
  • Kawachi, Nori, Claude Monet, p. 19
  • Brettell, Richard R. and Stephen F. Eisenman, Nineteenth-Century Art in the Norton Simon Museum, volume 1,2006,
  • Mount, Charles Merrill, Monet, pp. 76-77, 86-87, 90-91, 95-97, 403
  • The New Painting: Impressionism 1874-1886,fig. 3 p. 95
  • Mack, Gerstle, Paul Cézanne, p. 187
  • Rich, Daniel Catton, Art Institute of Chicago Quarterly, p. 28
  • Bricon, Étienne, Psychologie d'Art. Les Maîtres de la fin du XIXe siècle, pp. 297-298
  • Hodge, Susie, Claude Monet (Artists and Their World), p. 11
  • Chavange, R., Le Figaro Artistique, p. 147
  • Kimball Art Museum, Catalogue of the Collection, pp. 200, 202
  • Wildenstein, Daniel, Claude Monet: Biographie et catalogue raisonné,no. 51 pp. 138-139
  • Kostenevich, Albert, Hidden Treasures Revealed: Impressionist Masterpieces and Other Important French Paintings Preserved by the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg,fig. 2 pp. 132, 134
  • Robiquet, Jean, L'impressionnisme vécu, p. 62
  • Dubosc, G., Journal de Rouen, p. 4
  • James H. Rubin, Edouard Manet: Initiale M, L'Oeil, Une Main,2011, Fig. 87 p. 258
  • Taillandier, Yvon, Monet, p. 93
  • Monet: A Retrospective, p. 32
  • Grappe, Georges, Monet, p. 13
  • Degand, Léon and Denis Rouart, Claude Monet, p. 32
  • Cahen, Gustave, Eugène Boudin; sa vie & son oeuvre, pp. 106-107
  • Mühlberger, Richard, O Que Faz de um Monet um Monet?, pp. 7 - 9
  • Régamey, R., Gazette des Beaux-Arts, p. 76
  • Isaacson, Joel, Observation and Reflection: Claude Monet,fig. 2 pp. 14, 193
  • Privat, Gonzague, Place aux jeunes! Causeries critiques sur le Salon de 1865, p. 190
  • Seiberling, Grace, Porticus (Journal of the Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester),fig. 3 p. 41
  • Cassou, Jean, Les Impressionnistes et leur époque, p. 17
  • Alexandre, Arsène, Claude Monet, pp. 34, 36, (opp. p. 36)
  • Campbell, Sara, Collector Without Walls: Norton Simon and His Hunt for the Best,2010, cat. 992 p. 360
  • Wildenstein, Daniel, Kindlers Malerei Lexikon, pp. 466, 470
  • Impressionist Revolution, p. 254
  • Tabarant, Adolphe, La vie artistique au temps de Baudelaire, p. 425
  • Lathève, Jacques, Impressionnistes et Symbolistes devant la presse, pp. 29-30
  • Thiébault-Sisson, François, Le Temps, p. 3
  • Eisenman, Stephen, Monet: Atti dei convegno (Symposium essays: 'Monet. I luoghi della pittura'), p. 139-141
  • Gimpel, René, Art in America, p. 173
  • Petrie, Brian, Claude Monet: The First of the Impressionists,fig. 8 p. 16
  • Mathey, François, L'impressionnisme, p. 37
  • Pigalle, L'autographe au Salon de 1865 et dans les ateliers,pen drawing p. 76
  • Wildenstein, Daniel, Monet: Catalogue Raisonné/Werkverzeichnis,no. 51
  • Geffroy, Gustave, Claude Monet, sa vie, son temps, son oeuvre, pp. 27-28
  • Wildenstein, Daniel, Monet. Impressions, pp. 14, 16
  • Duret, Théodore, Histoire d'Édouard Manet et de son oeuvre avec un catalogue des peintures et des pastels, p. 61
  • National Gallery of Scotland, Lighting up the Landscape: French Impressionism and Its Origins,fig. 4 p. 18
  • Graber, Hans, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, Claude Monet nach eigenen und fremden Zeugnissen, pp. 166-167
  • Sietz, William C., Monet,fig. 5 pp. 10, 16, 46
  • Dewhurst, Wynford, Impressionist Painting: Its Genesis and Development, p. 39
  • Philadelphia Museum of Art, Manet and the Sea,fig. 63 p. 202
  • Fels, Marthe de, La vie de Claude Monet, p. 73
  • House, John, Monet,fig. 2 p. 6
  • Stoll, Robert Thomas, Die Französischen impressionisten, pp. 33-34
  • Mantz, Paul, Gazette des Beaux-Arts, p. 26
  • Shimada, Norio; and Sakagami, Keiko, Claude Monet, Volume I, 1858-1880,fig. 12 p. 32
Listen
Audio Tour
English | Español
Read
Audio Tour Transcript
English | Español
Escuchar
Audioguía
English | Español
Leer
Transcripción de Audioguía
English | Español

Additional Artwork by Artist

The Artist's Garden at Vétheuil Claude Monet 1881
The Entrance to the Port of Le Havre (formerly The Entrance to the Port of Honfleur) Claude Monet c. 1867-1868

Image reproduction permission may be granted for scholarly or arts related commercial use. All image requests, regardless of their intended purpose, should be submitted via the reproduction request form.

Images may be protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights. Additional permission may be required.

Approved requests for the reproduction of an image will receive a contract detailing all fees and conditions of use of the image. Upon receipt of both the signed contract and full payment, the Office of Rights and Reproductions will provide the image. A complimentary copy of the published material must be provided to the Norton Simon Museum.

Reproduction Request Form