Claude Monet

Monet grew up in the Normandy port of Le Havre, where the landscape painter Eugène Boudin introduced him to painting outdoors. He was the heart of Impressionism and painted directly from nature all his life.

Desperately poor in his early years, he later achieved wealth and fame, settling at Giverny, where he created his own water-lily pond. Despite cataracts in old age, he painted the monumental Water Lilies series.