The Magpie

The Magpie is considered one of the best snow scenes painted by Monet out of his 140 snow scenes. It was created in the winter of 1868-1869 near the commune of Étretat in Normandy. Louis Joachim Gaudibert, a patron of Monet, helped secure a home in Étretat for Monet's fiancée Camille Doncieux and her infant son, enabling Monet to work comfortably next to his family while painting.

The Magpie depicts a farmhouse on a snowy day. Under a clear, cold sky at the beginning of a snowstorm, with the snow covering everything on the ground, the black magpies resting on the fence, bathed in the winter sun, form blue shadows on the freshly snowed ground. The Magpie is the only creature in the painting, bringing life to the quiet countryside after the snowfall. Viewers can hear the Magpie spreading their wings and chirping loudly.

The Magpie gives a sense of coldness in winter and the warmth of the sunlight falling on the earth through the clouds, which also conveys the warm and quiet state of Monet's mind when he was at the farmhouse at that time. In this painting, Monet boldly used the change of light and shade, the fusion of warm and cool colors, the interplay of light and dark, and the staggering expression of subtle dynamics. This use of colored shadows became one of the characteristics of Impressionist works. In this white snowy scene, he boldly experimented with shades of red, blue, purple and yellow. The farmhouse's warm tones contrast with the roof's coolness and the fence's dark blue tones. The sky behind the trees in the farmhouse is painted brighter and warmer, and the trees to the right of the gate are lighter in color.

Monet accurately recorded the pale blue shadows cast by the fence wall after the snow, the reflection of the snow and the sunlight against each other, the subtle and fleeting movement, and the mesmerizing beautiful scene. According to Monet, painting should be done directly in nature to record the feeling directly and simply, or at least the artists' personal impressions and feelings.

However, this outstanding painting, The Magpie, which depicts the beauty and lightness of the snowy winter countryside to the extreme, was not accepted by art critics and viewers at that time and was rejected by the Salon and excluded from the exhibition. Today, The Magpie is a museum treasure at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris and is admired by many artists and visitors.

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