Water Lilies
Claude Monet really liked water lilies. When he bought a house about an hour outside of Paris in Giverny, he diverted a stream and created a pond that he filled with these flowers. The story goes that the neighbors got totally ticked off - they were dairy farmers, and they claimed that the lilies were messing with the taste of the water their cows were drinking downstream, and it made their cheese taste pretty weird. OK. We're in France. All of their cheese tastes weird. But the lily water drinking cows' cheese was said to be pretty awful.
Anyway, Monet is said to have ignored his neighbors' complaints, and as a result there are some iconic paintings of his water lilies in museums and very rich people's homes around the world.
The picture above is a photo that I took on a visit to his gardens. This is his pond, and these are probably direct descendants of the lilies that he placed in the pond back in the day. Pretty cool, huh?
When the pandemic is over and we can travel again, if you go to France, this is an amazing side trip from Paris. Or you can visit the Orangerie, the galary where Monet's water lily panels are on display.
Comments(17)