Claude Monet

Boussod, Valadon et Cie, Paris (acquired from the artist in June 1889)

Williams and Everett, New York (by 1891)

Mr. and Mrs. James F. Sutton, New York (by circa 1905 and sold: Plaza Hotel, New York, January 16-17, 1917, lot 154)

Durand-Ruel New York, (acquired at the above sale and until at least 1948)

Sale: Galerie Charpentier, Paris, June 11, 1958, lot 287

Wildenstein Gallery, New York

Meredith Long, Houston (by 1961)

Acquired from the above by the family of the present owners circa 1962

(possibly) Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, Monet-Rodin, 1889, no. 140

Boston, Copley Hall, Monet-Rodin, 1905, no. 77

Boston, Brooks Reed Gallery, 1920

Paris, Musée de l'Orangerie, Cl. Monet, 1931, no. 87

Tokyo, Bridgestone Museum of Art; Nagoya, City Art Museum; Hiroshima, Museum of Art, Monet: A Retrospective, 1994, no. 50

Houston, Museum of Fine Arts (on loan from 1962 until 1964)

Houston, Kindcaid School (on loan in 1964)

Houston, Museum of Fine Arts (on loan from May 23, 1980 until 2006) 

"Claude Monet Exhibit Opens," Boston Post, March 15, 1905

Arsène Alexandre, Cl. Monet, Paris, 1921, discussed p. 88

(possibly) Gustave Geffroy, Cl. Monet, sa vie, son temps, son oeuvre, Paris, 1922, discussed p. 118

John Rewald, "Theo van Gogh, Goupil and the Impressionists," Gazette des Beaux Arts, January-February 1973, appendix I, p. 100

Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet, Biographie et catalogue raisonné, vol. III, Lausanne & Paris, 1979, no. 1237, illustrated p. 127; discussed in letter no. 950, p. 244

Daniel Wildenstein, Claude Monet, catalogue raisonné, vol. V, Lausanne, 1991, no. 1237, listed p. 47

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet, Catalogue Raisonné, vol. III, Cologne, 1996, no. 1237, illustrated p. 472 (catalogued with incorrect provenance)

Marie-Christine Decroocq of the Wildenstein Institute has assisted with clarifying the provenance of this work.

The present work is one of approximately twenty compositions Monet painted while staying at Fresselines between March and May, 1889, depicting views in the region of the river known as the Grande Creuse. Many of those paintings were executed from a high vantage point looking down upon the Valley of the Creuse and are characterized by deep, sonorous colors.

La Roche-Blond overlooks the left bank of the Grande Creuse and the Fresselines bank is visible in the foreground of the present work.  A preliminary drawing for both the present work another related view of the village at dusk in which Monet worked out the snake-like bend of the river is in the collection of the Musée Marmottan.