Custom Monet Style Painting from Your Photo

Your photograph goes in; an oil painting made by hand comes out, either true to the picture or reworked in the manner of Claude Monet. A written quote costs nothing, and nothing is paid until you accept it.

What Monet’s manner means for a photograph

Monet learned outdoor painting from Eugène Boudin around 1858, when he was a young man in Le Havre. In 1872 he painted the port from a hotel window there, and when the picture was shown in 1874 a critic’s mocking review supplied the name Impressionism. In 1875 he painted his wife Camille and their son Jean in a meadow at Argenteuil, probably in a few hours, with the wind in her veil and her white dress set against clouds. Woman with a Parasol is the picture to keep in mind: light and weather decide the colour, and the brush follows.

Monet kept painting what stood close to home. He rented a house at Giverny in 1883, bought it in 1890, and in 1901 enlarged the pond by buying a meadow across the Ru. Your subject does not need to be grand: a garden, a gate or a person at a window is enough.

In the Monet-inspired direction, your photograph keeps its composition and its faces. Sky, water and leaves are rebuilt in short separate touches of colour, and shadows pick up colour from their surroundings. In the faithful direction, colours and details stay as in the photograph. You choose the direction when you send the request.

What you receive is a fresh painting in Monet’s manner. It is not an original by him and not a copy of a museum picture.

Eight starting points

• Portrait: one person, painted from a single clear photograph.
• Couple portrait: two people, from one picture or two. Monet met Camille in 1865 and married her in 1870.
• Family portrait: a household in one frame, in the garden light of his Argenteuil years.
• Pet portrait: your dog, your cat or a horse you ride.
• House painting: the home you know, with its garden and its weather.
• Landscape: a coast, a garden or a view, in the hour you remember. Monet painted the same haystacks through the winter of 1890 and 1891.
• Grandparents portrait: two generations, often from old prints.
• Wedding portrait: the day, or an anniversary years later.

For a first look at the treatment of garden light, see Garden at Sainte-Adresse, painted in the summer of 1867 at a terrace garden near Le Havre.

Questions people ask before choosing

Will my painting turn into water lilies?

No. The water lilies belong to the garden Monet built at Giverny. Your subject stays yours, and only the handling of light and colour follows him.

Is an ordinary snapshot good enough?

A sharp, well-lit photograph is enough. The more of the original file you send, the more detail the painting can hold. A short written brief can sit alongside it.

What separates the two directions in practice?

Take a photograph of a woman on a lawn. The faithful painting keeps the lawn a smooth green. The Monet-inspired one breaks it into yellow, blue-green and olive touches, and lets a little sky colour into her white dress.

Is the painting a copy of a famous picture?

No. Your subject is the subject, and Monet’s pictures are a guide to handling only.

Sizes, finishes and terms

Sizes follow the proportions of your photograph, from small to large. Your canvas can be rolled in a tube, stretched over bars and ready to hang, or framed.

• Starting price: a painting of one subject on the smallest canvas, sent rolled, starts at $218 (30 × 40 cm, rolled canvas).
• Time at the easel: 2 to 4 weeks.
• Before dispatch, a photograph of the finished canvas is sent to you, and corrections are possible.
• Delivery once shipped: 5 to 7 business days.
• You can cancel your order at any time until it ships.
• Return period: 30 days.

How a request moves

Send your references

Photographs are optional at first. A written description is enough to start.

Read the written quote

It lists sizes, finishes and prices. Nothing is charged until you accept.

Approve the canvas

The painting is made in oil, photographed and shown to you, and only then shipped.

Send your photo for a quote