Marmottan Monet museum in Paris to showcase rarely shown Monet, Pissarro, Sisley, Renoir, Cézanne and Degas works
A treat for impressionist fans has just opened at a Paris museum where 80 paintings and 20 graphic works never before shown to the public are on display.
The paintings – including Claude Monet's rarely shown masterpieces Sur les Planches de Trouville and Hotel des Roches Noires, Trouville – have been loaned by 50 private collectors. The exhibition includes other paintings by Monet, Pissarro, Sisley, Renoir, Cézanne and Degas.
The works come from private collections all over the world, including the UK. Many donors have preferred to remain anonymous, but the exhibition contains paintings loaned by Pérez Simón of Mexico, Texan corporate lawyer Erich Spangenbergl, financier Scott Black (who contributed a Cézanne, a Monet and a Degas portrait of the artist's father), and the Nahmad and Larock-Granoff families.
The exhibition, called Les Impressionistes en privé: 100 chefs d'oeuvre de collections particulieres" (Impressionist works from private collections, 100 masterpieces), is being held by the Marmottan Monet museum to celebrate its 80th anniversary. The museum contains an unrivalled collection of works by Monet and Berthe Morisot.
The unique exhibition – running until 6 July – displays the paintings in chronological order, beginning with the early works, including Boudin's La Plage de Bénerville, and Manet's Le Bar aux Folies Bergères.
The impressionist masterworks are saved for the end. Renoir is well-represented, and the exhibition includes his Madame Renoir et son chien, which has never been on show until now.
Each impressionist is represented by about a dozen works, spanning an entire career. The impressionists often returned to paint the same scene, as Monet did with the waterlilies at his home in Giverny or with Rouen cathedral at different times of day.
The Musée d'Orsay holds another version of his painting of the seafront at the Normandy resort of Trouville, whose boardwalk with its strollers on a sunny day is immortalised in the 1870 picture on display at the Marmottan.