Charing Cross Bridge 09 1901

Claude Monet made this painting, using strokes of blues, purples, and pinks to create a hazy, atmospheric view. Imagine Monet, standing there, brush in hand, squinting at the scene before him. The painting feels like a fleeting moment, a sensory impression caught in time. The bridge emerges and dissolves in a haze of color. What’s remarkable is how much information and emotion Monet packs into these dabs of paint. See how the pink hovers over the purple, and the tiny flicks of peach? They could be smoke, or light, or dreams. Monet painted this scene multiple times; I imagine him returning again and again to the same place, trying to capture the way light transforms everything we see. You get the sense that for him, painting was a way of thinking, of seeing, of feeling. Painting for Monet wasn’t just about recording what was in front of him, but about exploring the very act of perception. And each painting is like a new thought, a new feeling, a new way of seeing the world.