Stack of Wheat, Thaw, Sunset

The artwork

Beneath the stack you see lies the trace of a different one: the museum's analyses revealed that Monet first painted it wider and more central, and then made it narrower. You receive it printed on handmade Amalfi paper, in a handmade frame.

• A single stack, the melting snow and the pink sky of sunset.
• Warm, earthy tones, welcoming in a study or beside a bookcase.
• A gift for anyone who loves discovering how a painting comes to life.

Experts at the Art Institute of Chicago examined the canvas with X-rays and infrared, two kinds of light that pass through the layers of paint and show what lies beneath. They saw that Monet changed the painting profoundly: he greatly reduced the width of the stack and moved the horizon line, perhaps more than once.

He built up the field in the foreground from dark to light, starting with reddish browns and dark violets. In places he scraped or wiped away paint that was still wet, and here and there the bright greens of earlier versions show through.

He signed and dated the canvas "Claude Monet 91" when the paint beneath was already dry, that is, once the work was finished. It is one of the stacks Monet painted in 1890 and 1891 in the field near his house at Giverny, in Normandy, and today it is in the Art Institute of Chicago, which received it as a gift in 1983.

In a study or beside a bookcase it is a painting to look at up close. Think of it for someone who paints, or for anyone who loves the secrets hidden behind things.

Unique quality material

Print on handmade Amalfi paper
Sheet size: 29 x 42 cm (11.4 x 16.5 in)
With frame: 31 x 44 cm (12.2 x 17.3 in)
Material: artwork printed on very fine handmade Amalfi paper with deckled edges
Frame: dark brown with gold fillet, handmade, with glass