The Pont Neuf

Claude Monet

1871

Oil on canvas

Dallas Museum of Art

Images of city life captured in oil paint in a loose, sketchy style, as seen here, were a novelty in 1870s France. Monet chose the bustling inhabitants of Paris as his subject, emphasizing the blur of people, carriages, and boats coming and going through his use of rapidly applied brushstrokes and unfinished forms. This approach defined the Impressionist movement Monet helped launch just a few years later. It rebelled against the naturalistic style and more timeless, picturesque subjects favored by art critics and collectors at the time. Here, Monet reveled in evoking the look and feel of modern life on a cold, rainy day. Images of