Monet was born in Paris, France. His family moved to [Le Havre]? in Normandy when he was five. His father wanted him to go into the family grocery store business, but Claude wanted to paint. [Eugene Boudin]?, an artist who worked extensively on plein air paintings - quick sketches made in open air - at beaches in Normandy, taught him some painting techniques in 1856. Monet had to serve in the army in Algeria. His aunt Lecadre agreed to get him out of the army if he took an art course at a university. He left the army, but he did not like the traditional painting styles the university taught.
He studied with [Charles Gleyre]?. Monet could also use the studio and paint its models for a low cost. He painted [Camille Doncieux]?, and later they got married. He painted "Women in the Garden" in the late 1860s. He didn't finish it for a long time because he only painted it when he had the right light. They moved to a house in Argenteuil, near the [Seine River]?, after he and his wife had their first child. They lived there for six years until Camille died. Monet moved to a house in Giverny where he planted a large garden.
He painted many paintings of water lilies, his pond, and bridge. His garden had a meadow with willows and a marsh. He married [Alice Hoschede]? in 1892, who he had an affair with while he was married to Camille. He also painted up and down the banks of the Seine.
He went to Holland in the spring of 1886. He painted the scenery around Giverny when he returned. He made paintings of his daughters-in-law in a rowboat. He painted images of his garden repeatedly from 1900 until 1926.
Monet's most famous paintings were done near the end of his life when he painted Rouen cathedral and his garden. His garden had rhododendrons, water lilies, weeping willows, climbing plants, irises, and lime, apple, maple, cherry and chestnut trees. In the 1880s and 1890s Monet painted a series of paintings of the Rouen? Cathedral from different points of view and at different times of the day. Twenty views of the cathedral were exhibited at the Durand-Ruel gallery in 1895. He also painted series paintings of haystacks.
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