Ultimately, Monet’s desire to be alone in nature is exemplified in his latest painting, Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre dans le Jardin (1866): despite the title, the tree in the center of the painting is unquestionably the true subject of the painting; Jeanne-Marguerite, Monet’s cousin, seems to be an afterthought, rather than a key component of the painting. She turns away from us, gazing at the tree; like Monet, she is absorbed by nature. The bright red flowers make a recognizable “carpet” underneath, drawing more emphasis to the tree. Monet no longer bothers with the details of clothing: Jeanne-Marguerite’s dress is generic, plain and white, symbolizing Monet’s movement away from focusing on the human figure. Instead, the landscape is without question the most detailed part of Monet’s painting, as if he has transferred the decorative nature of his figures’ clothing to the garden. Monet has also minimized the number of figures in his painting: originally, Monet had a man in the background of the painting; this removal suggests he had learned from his past paintings that he was not interested in the figures in his paintings (Wildenstein, 38). Monet’s desire to become one with nature has been projected onto Jeanne-Marguerite: she stands in line with the two trees, imitating their form with her parasol held above her head, mimicking the shape of the branches of a tree, and her skirt billowing out, as the flowers do at the bottom of the central tree; even her shadow echoes the trees’ shadows. It is as if she is trying to become a tree, to become one with nature. This painting, with its emphasis on nature rather than the figure, marks a departure from Zola’s “dream” of posing figures in a landscape: the attention is clearly on the landscape, and it would appear Monet has realized his own “dream” of painting landscapes that can be considered as “important” as figure paintings.
Image:Monet, Claude. Jeanne-Marguerite Lecadre dans le Jardin, 1867. State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.
Scanned from: Wildenstein, Daniel. Monet: Catalogue Raisonné. Vol. 2. Köln: Taschen, 1994. 4 vols.