Monet at Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
The Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen holds paintings by Claude Monet within one of northern Europe’s most enjoyable museums. Built around a glass-domed winter garden filled with palms, it pairs a great collection of antiquities with an outstanding French nineteenth-century holding, and the contrast is part of the pleasure.
A brewer’s gift to a city
The museum exists because of Carl Jacobsen, of the Carlsberg brewing family, who gave his collection to the Danish public in 1888 and funded the building that houses it. He collected ancient sculpture with real seriousness and French art with equal appetite, and the museum’s French department became one of the strongest outside France, notably for its comprehensive holdings of Degas bronzes. Jacobsen bought steadily over decades and kept adding to the gift, so the museum grew during his lifetime rather than arriving complete.
The Impressionist paintings are shown in daylit rooms of domestic scale, and Danish light does something particular to them; on an overcast Copenhagen afternoon, Monet’s greys look exactly right. Seen after the Roman portrait busts and Etruscan bronzes downstairs, his fugitive weather effects register as the opposite of monumental, which is presumably part of why Jacobsen wanted the two collections under a single roof. Every painting shown below can be commissioned as a hand-painted oil reproduction or ordered as an archival canvas print.
5 Monet works from Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
These paintings suit Nordic and Nordic-inspired interiors almost too neatly: muted greens, water greys and pale skies against light timber, white walls and simple frames. They are quiet pictures that hold their own in low winter light, which is exactly when most art in a home stops working. Consider hanging one where you see it from a seated position rather than from the doorway, since the interest here is in tone rather than drama. A single canvas in a medium format is usually enough. Explore the full collection if you would like alternatives.
Official collection: Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek