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How to Read Paintings: Wild Poppies by Claude Monet
The famous view that brings colour and context to life
What is it that’s so captivating about this painting by Claude Monet? It seems to contain so little drama, so little incident or thrill, except for the Coquelicots — otherwise known as Wild Poppies in English. Yet the painting has become one of the most recognisable works of art ever made.
Its brilliance lies behind a veneer of apparent simplicity. It shows a woman and a child wandering through a meadow of grasses. They have just descended down the bank. One senses they are on a journey, a day out walking, probably from the large red-roofed house in the background. This is the first fleck of artistry: the hint of narrative that breathes a spark of psychological life into the scene.
The woman with the parasol and the child next to her are probably Monet’s wife, Camille, and their son Jean. They walk together; yet she also steps momentarily ahead of the child, who for now is occupied with his bunch of picked flowers.
This stepping away matters because it creates a subtle disjuncture. Along with the gesture of the parasol dropping down below her shoulder, it gives the woman her independence, seeming to speak of release or freedom. Her private cast of mind is revealed here, instigating our own curiosity about what might be passing through her thoughts.
This woman is, I think, the true heart of the painting. The shade of blue of her parasol — considering the full palette of the whole painting — is perfectly chosen. Whilst the poppies were perhaps the ideal choice of flower, since their bright red colouration could stand out so well against the grey-green grasses, the blue is a note of singular contrast — the strongest in the whole lower half of the image.
Notice too where the strongest points of blue in the sky are: in the top left quadrant, so that the upper left and the lower right of the…
