The Fondation Claude Monet is a nonprofit organisation that runs and preserves the house and gardens of Claude Monet in Giverny, France, where Monet lived and painted for 43 years. Monet was inspired by his gardens, and spent years transforming them, planting thousands of flowers. He believed that it was important to surround himself with nature and paint outdoors. He created many paintings of his house and gardens, especially of water lilies in the pond, the Japanese bridge, and a weeping willow tree.
With a total of 530,000 visitors in 2010, it is the second most visited tourist site in Normandy after the island of Mont Saint-Michel. The house and gardens have been recognised as among the Maisons des Illustres, and a Jardin Remarquable, rewarding their outstanding qualities. The estate was classified as a monument historique in 1976.
Monet's paintings of the gardens, especially the sites' pond with water lilies, are exhibited in dozens of major collections.
History
Claude Monet lived and painted in Giverny from 1883 to his death in 1926, and directed the renovation of the house, retaining its pink-painted walls. Colours from the painter's own palette were used for the interior -green for the doors and shutters, yellow in the dining room, complete with Japanese Prints from the 18th and 19th centuries, and blue for the kitchen. Monet had the nearby river Epte partially diverted for the gardens and hired up to seven gardeners to tend to it. Monet gained much of his inspiration from his gardens and believed it was important to surround himself with nature and paint outdoors.
When Monet died in 1926, the entire estate was passed on to his son Michel. As he never spent time in Giverny, it was left to Blanche Hoschedé Monet, the daughter of Alice and the widow of Jean Monet, to look after the garden with the help of former head gardener Louis Lebret. After Blanche died in 1947, the garden was left untended.
Michel Monet died heirless in a car crash in 1966. He had bequeathed the estate to the Académie des beaux-arts. From 1977 onwards, , then curator at the Palace of Versailles, played a key role in the restoration of the neglected house and gardens, which had been left in a desolate state. In a bid to raise funds, he and his wife Florence appealed to American donors through the "Versailles Foundation-Giverny Inc.". They, thereafter, dedicated themselves to its restoration. Substantial work needed to be done; the floors and ceiling beams were rotting while a staircase had already collapsed. Most of the window panes in both the greenhouse and main house had shattered long ago, and three large trees had begun to grow in the studio. Walter Annenberg, an American philanthropist that owned Triangle Publications, funded an underpass for easier access to the water garden so that guests would no longer have to go across a busy road.
The Fondation Claude Monet was created in 1980 as the estate was declared public. It soon became very successful and now welcomes both French and international visitors from April to November.
When Gérald Van der Kemp died in 2001, Florence Van der Kemp became the curator of the Fondation Monet and continued renovating the property until her death in 2008.
Hugues Gall was appointed Director of the Fondation Claude Monet by the Académie des beaux-arts in March 2008.
As one of the most visited tourist destinations in France, strategies around ensuring long term protection for the garden are observed as a matter of protocol.
Restoration and donations
Americans donated almost all of the $7 million needed to restore Monet's home and gardens at Giverny in the 1970s. These donations were part of American diplomacy to France since "France lacked the American tradition of private giving as well as the tax concessions that encourage it." Starting in 1969, under U.S. President Richard M. Nixon, Americans could claim tax deductions for their contributions to charities and this in turn aided the preservation of France's architectural heritage. Nixon encouraged Americans to donate to France. "I felt that encouraging Americans to contribute to the heritage of France, one of our oldest allies, would be one way to remind ourselves that the past in many ways is infinitely more important than the present." For his service, Nixon was inducted into the Academie des Beaux-Arts as one of the 15 foreign members, following former President Dwight D. Eisenhower's induction in 1952.