The One With The Challenge: An Art Piece

I love art.

I love the way people can express themselves in so many different ways through art. Painting, charcoal, photography, sculpture. It is all an insight into an artist's soul. For me, art is very personal because we are seeing an intimate part of someone. A part they had to get out onto the canvas or through clay. A part that just had to shared with the world, even if they are the only people who see it. It was a part that was too brilliant to stay inside them. Art is expression in it's highest form.

I like and appreciate all types of art, but painting are my choice medium. Maybe because my mother used to paint long ago and I always fascinated in the dedication and imagination it takes to bring a blank canvas to life. I have my favorite selections, like Chat Noir and anything by Andy Warhol. However, impressionists are really the ones that stir my emotional juices the most. Renoir's Girl Gathering Flowers is so peaceful and idyllic, you can picture her on a hillside on a gloriously blue skied day just selecting the most beautiful blossoms. Degas entire dance series is so sweet and innocent. The art of dance captured brilliantly in each stroke.

But no artist compares for me other than Claude Monet. I have been a Monet fanatic ever since I first saw the wall length picture of water lilies when I was 12 at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. That painting began my love affair with art museums and art. When I found out I could go to art museums free as a student, I made quick use of that privilege all through middle school, high school and college. One of my absolute favorite things to do when I was stressed was to go and just wander the rooms and lose myself in the masterpieces hanging on the walls. But I always stayed the longest in the Impressionist wings. I love the Boston art museum, have been to the MET several times and have a soft spot of the Cleveland Museum of Art because I spent countless hours in there. The lack of an art museum is one of the things I despise most about Las Vegas. No culture like back east.

Most of Monet's work are among my favorites, especially his poppy series. But I think the impression that first water lily painting made on me had a lasting impact because that entire series is held dear in my heart. I even own several different water lily prints.


When I was sixteen, I was lucky enough to go to France on school trip and visit the place that inspired Monet's most famous painting series. It was a moment I will never forget. Walking across that foot bridge and gazing into the same flower strewn water as my most favorite artist was a surreal experience.


I also love the history surrounding how he painted these breath-taking works of art. Nearing the end of his life, Monet had moved to a tiny village in southern France. He had spectacular gardens and an amazing pond with a foot bridge and beautiful lilies floating in the water. He began painting the lilies, but soon began to go blind. The majority of his water lily series was done from memory once he went completely blind. I think it shows what an impact beautiful things can have on your soul.

I know my soul has been impacted by him.