La Gare St-Lazare

Beneath the great glass and iron roof of the Saint-Lazare station, Claude Monet found an unlikely subject worth painting again and again. This 1877 canvas pulses with the energy of one of the busiest railway hubs in Paris, though Monet cared little for its architectural precision. His eye was drawn instead to the drifting clouds of steam and smoke, and to the pale light that spills down through the roof and settles onto the platform in soft touches of blue, gray, and gold. A dark locomotive pushes forward through the haze while tiny travelers move like specks across the golden floor.

Monet became so absorbed by this place that he made about twelve paintings of it. Legend has it that he persuaded railway officials to hold back their trains and heap on extra coal, all so he could capture exactly the right swirls of vapor. That kind of obsession sat at the heart of Impressionism, a movement more interested in the mood of a passing moment than in crisp lines and sharp edges. Here Monet takes a noisy, smoky, thoroughly modern corner of industrial France and turns it into something surprisingly gentle and atmospheric.