Monet show in Hong Kong charts evolution of artist’s landscapes over 50 years

Big crowds expected for Heritage Museum exhibition which, unlike bigger shows, takes a focused look at how French Impressionist painter captured his impressions of places, and how his art evolved

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Heritage Museum staff set up the Monet exhibition Claude Monet: The Spirit of Place. Photo: Jonathan Wong

Published: 6:00am, 3 May 2016Updated: 5:54pm, 3 May 2016

In 2005, a record 284,000 people braved long queues to see a major exhibition of 50 paintings by Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir and Cezanne at the Hong Kong Museum of Art.

Since then, art lovers in this part of the world have had many opportunities to see Claude Monet’s paintings up close. In 2014, the K11 shopping mall in Shanghai staged China’s first solo Monet exhibition with 40 of his works. There’s even a multimedia Monet exhibition touring Chinese cities right now – though it only shows digital versions of the paintings.

The international auction houses often bring Impressionist works to Hong Kong to lure potential buyers ahead of auctions in New York and London. Wang Jianlin, chairman of China’s Dalian Wanda Group and Asia’s second-richest man, bought Monet’s Bassin aux nympheas, les rosiers for US$20.4 million in a New York auction last year.

In fact, Bassin aux nympheas, les rosiers is just one of a number of major Impressionist works that Chinese collectors have bought in recent years as they have charged into the modern art market, just like the Japanese did in the 1980s.