Claude Monet, La Pie, (The Magpie) 1868/1896. Musée d’Orsay, Paris. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

We call our Watermill courses ‘convivial creativity’ and we believe that creativity is often a communal, collaborative affair. There is individual genius, of course, but for it to flourish fully it needs support.

Take the picture above, to be seen in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. Claude Monet’s The Magpie stands out even on the dullest of days, an amazing Impressionist interpretation of the effects of light on snow. But as well as a manifestation of artistic genius, it is also a celebration of friendship and of the interconnection between art and technology.

Painting Outdoors: Art Meets Technology

Part of the Impressionist ethic was that paintings should be inspired by nature and that they should ‘seize and ‘freeze’ a moment in time: vital, immediate creations, not the premeditated and overworked studio paintings of the art establishment. And it meant painting outdoors – en plein air.

Outdoor painting however, only really became practical because of technological advance, notably, the invention in 1841 of ready-made oil paint in portable, collapsible metal tubes.

Dedicated Impressionists like Claude Monet painted en plein air whatever the weather. He was particularly obsessed by the effects of light on snow and on the ice of the frozen river Seine. A Parisian journalist wrote of an encounter with the artist in the 1870s:

‘It was cold enough to split rocks. We perceived a foot warmer, then an easel, then a gentleman bundled up, in three overcoats, gloves on his hands, his face half frozen; it was Monet studying an effect of snow.’

Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Monet met as art students in Paris in 1862. It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. They shared digs together and their early life resembled scenes from La Boheme: they survived on a diet of pulses, and they only turned on the oven to cook just before a model arrived. She needed to be kept warm while posing in the nude, and their meal was cooked at the same time.

When Monet was painting his snowy and icy scenes, Renoir brought out regular hot-water bottles to warm the hands of his dedicated friend and enable him to keep on working.

Friendship’s contribution to genius.

Claude Monet, La Pie (detail), 1868/1896. Musée d’Orsay, Paris, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

From Frozen France to Sunny Tuscany

There’s no need to worry about snow and ice on a Watermill painting holiday, of course. Sunny Italian weather is the order of the day.

And if, mayhap, it does become a little chilly, we have central heating in all our bedrooms and public rooms. If you feel too hot, all our rooms also have air conditioning, powered by our environmentally friendly solar panels, which make us self-sufficient in electricity.

All you have to do is to release your creativity, inspired by our internationally renowned tutors and supported by like-minded guests. Join us for one of our painting courses in Tuscany – we’d love to welcome you to The Watermill at Posara. Please click here for more.