Impression, Sunrise - June 2005 Painting

Artist: Claude Monet
Title: Impression, Sunrise (Impression, soleil levant)
Date: 1873

Location of Origin: Musee Marmotton, Paris
Medium: Oil on canvas
Style: Impressionism

Impression, Sunrise (Impression, soleil levant) is a painting by Claude Monet, for which the Impressionist movement was named.

Dated 1872, but probably created in 1873, its subject is the harbour of Le Havre, using very loose brush strokes that suggest rather than delineate it. Monet explained the title later: "I was asked to give a title for the catalogue; I couldn't very well call it a view of Le Havre. So I said: 'Put Impression.'"

It was displayed in 1874 during at the first independent art show of the Impressionists (who were not yet known by that name). Critic Louis Leroy, inspired by the painting's name, titled his hostile review of the show in Le Charivari newspaper, "The Exhibition of the Impressionists", thus inadvertantly naming the new art movement. He wrote:

Impression - I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape.

This painting is also featured in the hit movie 'Thomas Crown Affair' which valued it for a whooping 100 Million US Dollars.