To Know, to Understand, and to Dream
The French genius Victor Hugo once wrote: “The human mind possesses three magical keys. These keys unlock everything in the world! These keys are the number, the letter, and the note. To know, to understand, and to dream—therein lies our entire life!”
From an early age, the French genius Claude Monet knew and recognized his calling as an artist. Throughout his life, he contemplated how to realize his ultimate dream within his beloved art. Namely: to capture the movement of air and the warmth of a sunny day in his paintings; to seize upon canvas the elusive dance of light and the scents of a summer garden... And thus, masterpieces were born!
One of them is the magnificent series of paintings “Water Lilies”. "Landscapes of reflections," as the artist himself called them. Delicate, captivating with their fragile beauty. He painted them throughout his life. Here it is - a true love story.
The Price of a Masterpiece
Today, “Water Lilies” has become the embodiment of not only a masterpiece as a phenomenon, but also of the ultimate valuation that such a phenomenon can command. Time and again, at the renowned Sotheby’s and Christie’s auctions in London, Monet connoisseurs acquire these works for a staggering 20 to 40 million pounds sterling!
Mysterious Poetry
But let us return to the dreams and aspirations of Claude Monet… Was it not the very same thing that the artist’s contemporary and compatriot, the brilliant Claude Debussy, wrote of regarding his own beloved art?
“Only musicians possess that magic, an almost sorcerous ability to capture all the poetry of night and day, of earth and sky, to convey their atmosphere, their boundless pulsation, and their mystical dissolution into silence…”
And further: “...Moonlight! Is it truly possible to recreate its ‘mysterious poetry’ in painting, or even in photography, in cinematic art?.. ”
Let’s join these geniuses in trying to capture the “mysterious poetry” of nature.
Claude Monet: “Water Lilies”
