The Rue Montorgueil in Paris

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The Rue Montorgueil in Paris: Claude Monet

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Art Type: Oil Painting
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Claude Monet Oil Painting - The Rue Montorgueil in Paris

Keywords: Rue, Montorgueil, Paris

Work Overview: The Rue Montorgueil in Paris
Celebration of 30 June 1878
1878
Oil on canvas
Dimensions: w500 x h810 mm
Musee d'Orsay

The Rue Montorgueil, like its twin painting The Rue Saint-Denis (Rouen, musée des Beaux-arts), is often thought to depict a 14 July celebration. In fact it was painted on 30 June 1878 for a festival declared that year by the government celebrating "peace and work". This was one of the events organised for the third Universal Exhibition in Paris a few weeks after it opened, and intended to be a symbol of France’s recovery after the defeat of 1870. As well as demonstrating nationalist enthusiasm, the celebrations of 30 June 1878 were also an opportunity to strengthen the position of the Republican regime, still fragile only a few months after the major confrontations of 1876-1877 between its supporters and the conservatives. It was only two years later, in 1880, that 14 July was designated the French National Day.

This painting proposes a distanced vision of an urban landscape by a painter who did not mix with the crowd, but observed it from a window. The three colours vibrating in Monet's painting are those of modern France.

The impressionist technique, with its multitude of small strokes of colour, suggests the animation of the crowd and the wavering of flags. This allowed the American historian Philip Nord to write that it perfectly fits the "republican moment" marking the emergence of a democratic society and its roots in contemporary France. With this painting, Monet revealed a hidden aspect of modernity, while simultaneously achieving the work of a "reporter".

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This striking Impressionist work in 1878, The Rue Montorgueil in Paris (Celebration of 30 June 1878), was twinned with The Rue Saint-Denis and was thought to be connected to a July 14 celebration. However, it was painted June 30 for a government festival of "peace and work." It was one of the initiatives organized for the Universal exhibition in Paris and intended as a symbol of France's recovery following defeat in 1870. This urban lanascape is extremely "busy" with its flags expressing patriotism, following such fragility, with colors adding to the vibrancy of modern France and the milling crowd below.

The impressionist technique, with its multitude of small strokes of colour, suggests the animation of the crowd and the wavering of flags. This allowed the American historian Philip Nord to write that it perfectly fits the "republican moment" marking the emergence of a democratic society and its roots in contemporary France. With this painting, Monet revealed a hidden aspect of modernity, while simultaneously achieving the work of a "reporter".

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The Rue Montorgueil, like its twin painting The Rue Saint-Denis (Rouen, musée des Beaux-arts), is often thought to depict a 14 July celebration. In fact it was painted on 30 June 1878 for a festival declared that year by the government celebrating "peace and work". This was one of the events organised for the third Universal Exhibition in Paris a few weeks after it opened, and intended to be a symbol of France’s recovery after the defeat of 1870. As well as demonstrating nationalist enthusiasm, the celebrations of 30 June 1878 were also an opportunity to strengthen the position of the Republican regime, still fragile only a few months after the major confrontations of 1876-1877 between its supporters and the conservatives. It was only two years later, in 1880, that 14 July was designated the French National Day.

This painting proposes a distanced vision of an urban landscape by a painter who did not mix with the crowd, but observed it from a window. The three colours vibrating in Monet's painting are those of modern France.

The impressionist technique, with its multitude of small strokes of colour, suggests the animation of the crowd and the wavering of flags. This allowed the American historian Philip Nord to write that it perfectly fits the "republican moment" marking the emergence of a democratic society and its roots in contemporary France. With this painting, Monet revealed a hidden aspect of modernity, while simultaneously achieving the work of a "reporter".

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Rue Montorgueil (French pronunciation: [ʁy mɔ̃tɔʁɡœj]) is a street in the 1st arrondissement and 2nd arrondissement (in the Montorgueil-Saint Denis-Les Halles district) of Paris, France. Lined with restaurants, cafés, bakeries, fish stores, cheese shops, wine shops, produce stands and flower shops, rue Montorgueil is a place for Parisians to socialize while doing their daily shopping. At the southernmost tip of rue Montorgueil is Saint-Eustache Church, and Les Halles, containing the largest indoor (mostly underground) shopping mall in central Paris; and to the north is the area known as the Grand Boulevards.

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Flags were flown on 30 June, 1878, to mark the opening of the Great Exhibition. On that day, a sea of flags was fluttering in the wind, and countless people filled the streets. Monet chose a high vantage point in order to emphasize the huge gathering of people. Viewed at close quarters, the milling throng gives the illusion of an ethereal carpet of colour. It is not until one is at a certain distance from the painting that the concrete aspect of the picture comes into focus, and the people on the streets become recognizable as well as the individual flags, which look as though they have been released from the façades of the houses to the left and right.

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