About This Catalogue - Monet

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About This Catalogue

Director’s Statement

Welcome to an exciting new development at the intersection of publishing, scholarship, and technology: the Art Institute of Chicago’s response to the Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative (OSCI), sponsored by The Getty Foundation. What you are seeing on the screen before you represents, we believe, a model for the future of museum publishing that brings together current scholarship and state-of-the-art imaging technology in the service of one of the finest collections of Impressionist art in the world. It is our hope that the innovative online platform you experience here will make the important curatorial and conservation research that is part of every museum’s mission more broadly accessible and illuminating.

The Art Institute of Chicago’s collection of Impressionist art rivals that of any museum in the world. Featured in exhibitions around the globe and in numerous scholarly and popular publications, as well as in our own newly renovated and reinstalled galleries, this part of the museum’s collection is particularly well known and exceedingly rich. The Art Institute has contributed significantly to the scholarship on its own nineteenth-century collection, as well as on nineteenth-century art in general, by organizing groundbreaking exhibitions focused on the material history of particular works, including Van Gogh and Gauguin (2001) and Seurat and the Making of “La Grande Jatte” (2004). But a comprehensive, systematic research project devoted to our Impressionist paintings and drawings has yet to be instigated and published. These two digital volumes—on the work of Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir—are the first in the series Paintings and Drawings by the Impressionist Circle in the Collection of the Art Institute of Chicago.

We have long desired to produce a printed scholarly catalogue of the full nineteenth-century collection; our plans to do so began in earnest in 1999 with the establishment of the Art Institute’s David and Mary Winton Green Research Fund. Parallel to this research was a growing concern among museums about increased publication costs, modest print circulation, and the inability to update information in printed scholarly collection catalogues, one that was the subject of a session on the fate of the permanent collection catalogue at the 2008 annual meeting of the Association of Art Museum Curators. At the same time, The Getty Foundation initiated OSCI to explore the possibilities of presenting collection research digitally. It brought together a consortium of nine museums, including the Art Institute, to take on the task of developing sustainable and replicable models for online scholarly collection catalogues and assess how a change in the way museums think about publishing might impact institutional structures. Our Monet and Renoir catalogues embody the Art Institute’s contribution to this effort. In addition to our heartfelt thanks to The Getty Foundation for its vision and support, we want to acknowledge major support from the David and Mary Winton Green Research Fund. The Art Institute also received generous funding from the Samuel H. Kress Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, organizations that are interested in exploring the productive collaboration between art history and technology.

The Art Institute’s prototype for the OSCI project is the result of many discussions within our internal team as well as with colleagues in the larger OSCI consortium. Our primary challenge was twofold. We wanted to build a model that would address the requirements of scholars to have an authoritative, permanent, and citable research reference that would only be updated in future editions and would maintain the high standards of the Art Institute’s previously published print collection catalogues. But we also wanted to think more strategically about the definition of an online publication and take full advantage of the functionality that is only available in the digital realm. Indeed, our concept evolved through many hours of consideration; specifics of our discussions are put forth by Gloria Groom in the “Introduction and Acknowledgments” of this catalogue. Always at the core of our discussions, however, was the importance of contributing vital scholarship to the field and subjecting our online catalogue to the same academic rigor, curatorial insight, and editorial professionalism as its printed counterparts.

This project was truly a collaborative endeavor. The curatorial dimension of the project was overseen by Gloria Groom, David and Mary Winton Green Curator of Nineteenth-Century European Painting and Sculpture, with Jill Shaw, Research Associate in the Department of Medieval to Modern European Painting and Sculpture. Conservation efforts were led by Frank Zuccari, Grainger Executive Director of Conservation; Kimberley Muir, Assistant Research Conservator; and Kelly Keegan, Andrew W. Mellon Fellow of Paintings Conservation. Former Executive Director of Publications Susan F. Rossen and her successor, Robert V. Sharp, have been critical to the success of this project. The efforts of D. Samuel Quigley, Vice President for Collections Management, Imaging, and Information Technology/CIO; Elizabeth Neely, Director of Digital Information and Access; and IMA Lab at the Indianapolis Museum of Art were vital to the technological strides that we have made. Having developed this model using open-source software, we hope that it will serve as a springboard for future online publications within the museum community and in the humanities more broadly.
Douglas Druick
President and Eloise W. Martin Director
The Art Institute of Chicago

Introduction and Acknowledgments:

Introduction and Acknowledgments

The very definition of an online scholarly publication suggests accessibility and functionalities beyond print—a complex and groundbreaking endeavor entailing many challenges and opportunities.  In developing these volumes for the series Paintings and Drawings by the Impressionist Circle in the Collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, our goal was to create a publication that would embrace the new, exciting world of digitalization without leaving behind the weight and authority naturally ascribed to the book format. To do this, we recognized that first and foremost we would need to think about how to make the digital format familiar or comfortable enough for readers so that our catalogues would find a place among both scholars—those who primarily use the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection catalogues—and the wider range of users who entered them via our museum collection’s Web site.

The next challenge was to come up with a format that would not only be acceptable (and citable) as a scholarly publication but also take advantage of the capabilities of technology to develop a new way to present and do research. Initially, we aimed to produce a book based on our established print format and provide a link to a digitized, but noninteractive version from our Web site. After much reflection, we shifted to an all-inclusive approach, for which we considered providing essential and nonessential documentary materials, from which readers would draw their own conclusions. In the end, we chose to pursue a hybrid of the two approaches: the catalogue is written from the perspective of the curators and conservators of the Art Institute, and only necessary photographs and documentary materials are provided. However, we have developed a structure in which the reader can selectively read the catalogue in many different ways, as well as an interactive imaging tool to test the hypotheses we forge. With this strategic approach in mind, we also identified certain key concepts and features of printed books that were critical to our goal:

The content must speak to a scholarly audience and incorporate all of the categories of research—including new, extensive technical information—and high scholarly standards that have been used in print catalogues published by the Art Institute. Along the same lines, all content must be edited in the same rigorous manner as it is for printed books.

A high-resolution color image of the plate accompanying each catalogue entry must be easily accessible at all times throughout the entry so that the reader can refer to it in order to review or challenge our assessments.

The ability to footnote is essential to any scholarly catalogue, including digital ones. We have made an important “drawer” for footnotes that can be viewed or tucked away at any time.

Note taking is an important component of using print publications for research. To relieve anxiety over the loss of marginalia on the printed page, we wanted readers to be able to personalize their copies of the digital catalogues, allowing them to write notes, bookmark pages of interest, and simulate the use of Post-it notes.

Page numbering is key to navigation of the printed book. In the fluid online environment, paragraph numbers are a more reliable means of identifying locations and text. Without the tangible sensation of pages, however, readers could become disoriented. Thus, it became a requirement that readers would always have a sense of where they were in the catalogues and how much text was left in a particular entry.

Consistency and flexibility are also important. Although we tried to maintain a certain consistency in the publications’ appearance, we recognized that we were developing a model not only for our nineteenth-century collection but also for other areas of the Art Institute’s holdings. To this end, we wanted to build in flexibility so that future online books could have their own distinct design and organization.

But, above all, the most important issue for us was the catalogues’ citability. We wanted them to have a permanent, fixed publication date that could be easily and reliably cited by scholars.

Along with these booklike elements, we hoped to build a scholarly publication that would be technologically innovative. We wanted our readers to be able to access and explore the primary documentation we used to make our observations. This meant that we (as curators and authors) needed to learn what technology could do. This was perhaps the greatest lesson of all, since we had to not only learn from technology but also provide to the technology teams at both the Art Institute and the Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA Lab) a clear sense of the whats and hows of the research process. This labor-intensive but fully satisfying exchange enabled the technology teams to develop a prototype based on our experience as researchers, authors, and editors. We spent hours with the teams at the Art Institute and the IMA Lab, either in the same room or in conference calls, sharing our methodology for conducting research on and writing about works of art.

From the beginning, we conceived of a digital publication that would fully utilize and incorporate conservation documentation, for the first time allowing us to rely on the vast number of images generated through the varied examination processes. Our entries inform the existing art-historical literature with critical new research based on conservators’ findings. In this respect, we were exhilarated by the possibilities for imaging comparative, technical, and archival illustrations. We spent many dedicated hours honing our examination methodology and report format with the conservation team. This component of the project had a precedent from previous and ongoing printed scholarly publications within the museum, but there was no guidebook for the presentation of extensive conservation imaging. The interactive imaging tool that has made the multilayering of images possible developed as a result of thoughtful discussions about what various researchers (especially conservators, scientists, and art historians) and readers would find useful and meaningful. By introducing the technical images in this way, we know that we are presenting to our readers the raw materials—photographs, macros, overlays, and interactive imaging tools—from which we have drawn our conclusions. In addition to curatorial and conservation reports, we have included information about collectors and other documentation to provide a fuller understanding of any given object and its history at the Art Institute.

Our many conversations with the team at the IMA Lab were absolutely critical to developing the concept for this series. In considering our needs, they came back to the table with examples of online tools from diverse sources including Sci-Fi zines, sports sites, and CNN News that they thought might bring our wish list of requirements to life. At each stage of the brainstorming process, we were allowed to test-drive the results, ensuring that each step forward fit into the practical, philosophical, and aesthetic concept for the project.

Faced with unlimited possibilities, we nonetheless chose to impose certain limits on our publication. In order to focus on the development of the catalogues’ technological components, we decided to feature the works of two artists: Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. We also had to make a number of decisions, from the amount of documentary material to provide—we could only include those details or photographs from conservation or the museum’s archives that were directly related to the objects’ historical importance—to the word limits necessitated by certain aspects of the publications’ design. It was gratifying, however, to know that we were forging something new that would not only display research but also be the basis for further research using the functionalities for sorting, searching, and tagging that we were developing. In the past, or at least from our early investigation into a number of museum Web sites and collection resources, digital programs often shaped the research component of a project. Starting from the ground up, we built a sophisticated digital vehicle that bears all the hallmarks of the scholarly research and print publishing worlds and plunges us into an even richer contextual, factual, and visual sphere from which to consider the work itself.

For instigating and nurturing this multifaceted digital project, we have many people to thank. Most importantly are the major funders, beginning with the Getty Foundation, which offered the raison d’être and ongoing financial support for the project. We extend our sincere gratitude and admiration especially to Deborah Marrow, Director of the Getty Foundation; Joan Weinstein, Deputy Director of the Getty Foundation; and Kristin Kelly, consultant on the OSCI project. In addition the David and Mary Winton Green Research Fund has provided tremendous financial support for the research expenses, and for this we wish to thank Mary Winton Green, who has closely followed and applauded our progress. We also thank Max Marmor, director of the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, for seeing the potential value of the marriage of art history and technology, and providing valuable financial support for a digital assets and research assistant and a Kress Fellow in Paintings Conservation. Scientific research on materials and techniques at the Art Institute was made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. We would also like to thank the late Mrs. Eloise Martin and the Community Associates of the Art Institute for their support of the X-Ray Fluorescence analyzers that have enabled noninvasive palette determination for the paintings.

In its early stages, the project was supported by the Art Institute’s former director James Cuno, who has since been appointed president and Chief Executive Officer of the J. Paul Getty Trust, and by Susan Rossen, the former executive director of the Publications Department, whose success in publishing scholarly printed catalogues was a crucial factor in the Getty’s consideration of the Art Institute for its initiative. Critical at all stages of the project were the insight and support of Douglas Druick, in his role as the chair of the Department of Medieval to Modern European Painting and Sculpture and now as President and Eloise W. Martin Director of the Art Institute. Our special thanks go to Jill Shaw, Research Associate, who was the first to translate our original ideas for accessing multiple research disciplines into a visual model that allowed us to articulate our expectations with the technological teams in the early stages of the project. In addition to her primary role as catalogue researcher and author, she tirelessly served as the project’s first coordinator. Ably assisting her with the archival scans and captioning was Genevieve Westerby, Digital Assets and Research Assistant.

Essential to the critical conservation component of the project has been the support and guidance of Frank Zuccari, Grainger Executive Director of Conservation. Kimberley Muir, Assistant Research Conservator, and Kelly Keegan, Andrew W. Mellon Fellow of Paintings Conservation, worked unflaggingly to complete examinations, analyses, and writing, in addition to creating the annotated overlays and macros for the digital format that so brilliantly reveal the artist’s working process. As much as possible, this project has incorporated the most up-to-date analyses of pigments and grounds, and for this we are grateful to Francesca Casadio, Andrew W. Mellon Senior Conservation Scientist, and Inge Fiedler, Associate Research Microscopist.

The project would not have been feasible without the expertise and support of the Art Institute’s technological team. Our deepest gratitude goes to D. Samuel Quigley, Vice President for Collections Management, Imaging, and Information Technology/Chief Information Officer, for his leadership as we developed the project's concept, for connecting us with the IMA Lab, and for continuing to integrate this project with the larger technological initiatives of the museum. Special thanks go to Elizabeth Neely, Director of Digital Information and Access, for serving as our main conduit with IMA Lab and expertly guiding the team through the murkiness of the new (digital) world order; Carissa Kowalski Dougherty, Manager of Collection Information and Technology, for her behind-the-scenes support; and the newest member of the team, Amy Weber, Project Coordinator.

For the magnificent high-resolution color images, the ultraviolet light captures, and the archival photography of the works in these volumes, we thank Chris Gallagher, Director of Imaging; Senior Photographer Bob Hashimoto; and Amy Zavaleta, Photographic Archive Coordinator. For the graphic processing of image annotations, thanks go to Casey Gibbs, Imaging Technician.

To the IMA Lab, we extend our gratitude and congratulations for turning our ideas for the ideal research and publications tool into a reality that will serve as a template not only for these volumes but also for the future of online scholarly publishing at the Art Institute. We are grateful to Robert Stein, Deputy Director for Research, Technology, and Engagement; Charles Moad, Director, IMA Lab; and their team, who have been personally involved with all of us at the Art Institute, including Kyle Jaebker, Application Development Manager; Gray Bowman, Application Developer; Kris Arnold, Application Developer; and Matt Gipson, Senior Digital Graphic Designer.

This new hybrid of scholarly publication and technological interactivity has demanded an innovative publishing template that has been developed under the leadership of Robert V. Sharp, Executive Director of Publications, and Sarah E. Guernsey, Director of Publications. Editor Susan Weidemeyer has thrown herself wholeheartedly into learning and mastering the new platform for editing and linking in the digital format. At all stages, the print-to-digital project has been assisted by Lauren Makholm, Photography Editor, and Joseph Mohan, Production Coordinator.

A project of this magnitude would not have been possible without full access to and understanding of archival materials. Our deepest thanks go to Jack Perry Brown, Director of the Ryerson and Burnham Libraries, and Bart H. Ryckbosch, Glasser and Rosenthal Archivist, both of whom have followed the project from its incipient stage and have offered invaluable suggestions and resources.

Among the many challenges we faced at the instigation of this project were legal issues, for which we continue to rely on the expertise of Julie Getzels, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary; and Troy Klyber, Intellectual Property Manager. We would like to thank as well Jennifer Oatess for her continued help with reports and grant applications; Jeanne Ladd, Vice President of Museum Finance, and Budget Analyst Celeste Diaz for guiding us through the complicated budgets that this every-expanding project has entailed; and Michael Nicolai, Vice President for Human Resources, for his patience in helping us navigate the corporate waters of employing outside experts.

Also at the museum are a number of individuals who have offered their valuable time, expertise, and encouragement and who deserve our sincere thanks: David Thurm, Chief Operating Officer; Dorothy Schroeder, Vice President for Exhibitions and Museum Administration; Erin Hogan, Director of Public Affairs and Communications, and Chai Lee, Associate Director of Public Affairs; Jeff Wonderland, Director of Graphic Design; Pat Loiko, Executive Director of Museum Registration, Senior Registrar Darrell Green, and Registrar Greg Tschann; and volunteer Susanna Rudofsky, who generously offered her translating skills.

In future additions to these volumes, the same intensity of examination, technical reporting, and imaging that has taken place for works on canvas will be applied to the artists’ works on paper under the leadership of Harriet Stratis, Head of Paper Conservation and Conservator of Prints and Drawings, and Suzanne McCullagh, Acting Chair and Anne Vogt Fuller and Marion Titus Searle Curator of Earlier Prints and Drawings. The final volumes will feature the physical and scholarly assessments of Kimberly Nichols, Associate Conservator of Prints and Drawings, and Kristi Dahm, Associate Conservator of Prints and Drawings.

We are also grateful to many past and present colleagues and volunteers within the museum who have provided support, encouragement, and assistance for this project, including Susan Augustine, Kat Baetjer, Geri Banik, Christopher Brooks, Robert Burnier, Florence Cazenave, Stephanie D’Alessandro, Melanie Emerson, Gwénaëlle Gautier, Christina Giles, Faye Gleisser, Adrienne Jeske, Marina Kliger, Allison Langley, Leonard Leibowitz, Kristin Lister, Jane Neet, Curtis Osmun, Jennifer Paoletti, Charles Pietraszewski, Aza Quinn-Brauner, Ryerson and Burnham Libraries staff, Eve Straussman-Pflanzer, Jann Trujillo, Seth Vanek, Anna Vila-Espuna, Kirk Vuillemot, Sara Wohler, Martha Wolff, and Faye Wrubel.

Although these volumes constitute a team effort, the team was not only within the walls of the museum; it involved many others whom we would like to thank. For keeping the project on target and assisting in our periodic presentations at the Getty, we thank Hilary Walter, Christina Lopez, and the highly supportive Nik Honeysett, Head of Administration at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Special thanks are due to the team of scientists who devoted their time and expertise to the accurate registration of images for overlays and annotations: John K. Delaney, Senior Imaging Scientist at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at The George Washington University, Washington, D.C.; and Murray Loew and Damon M. Conover of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at The George Washington University. This challenging task, accomplished using a novel image-based algorithm that they had previously developed, was essential to making the overlay tool fully functional. C. Richard Johnson Jr., Cornell University; Don H. Johnson, J. S. Abercrombie Professor Emeritus, Rice University; and Robert G. Erdmann, University of Arizona, also contributed to the project, providing automated thread counts that have helped us compare canvas weaves among works by the same artist, greatly enhancing our understanding of the artist’s methodology. The capabilities for scientific analysis at the Art Institute have been enhanced by access to instrumentation and expertise at Northwestern University, thanks to our longstanding institutional collaboration in conservation science. In particular we are grateful to Benjamin D. Myers and Kate Venmar of the EPIC facility of the NUANCE Center at Northwestern University for their help with scanning electron microscopy. The NUANCE Center is supported by NSF-NSEC, NSF-MRSEC, Keck Foundation, State of Illinois, and Northwestern University.

In terms of the scope of our research, we would like to thank first the Durand-Ruel family—Flavie; her father, Paul-Louis Durand-Ruel; and Claire Durand-Ruel Snollaerts—for their valuable assistance in correcting or confirming provenance of works, which, in many cases, were sold through their eminent relative’s gallery. Thanks also to the many individuals outside the Art Institute who were always willing to share with us their insights and information, whether centered on the history of art or the technical aspects of our project: Claire Barry, Kimbell Art Museum; David Brenneman, High Museum of Art; Richard Brettell, University of Texas at Dallas; Barbara Buckley, Barnes Collection; Anthea Callen, author and independent art historian; Guy Cogeval, Musée d’Orsay; Sylvie Crussard, Fondation Wildenstein; Guy-Patrice Dauberville, Galerie Bernheim-Jeune; Claire Denis, Catalogue raisonné Maurice Denis; Michele Derrick, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Judith Dolkart, Barnes Collection; Isabelle Gaëtan, Musée d’Orsay; Paul Galvez, Gauguin catalogue raisonné; Charlotte Hale, Metropolitan Museum of Art; Ann Hoenigswald, National Gallery of Art; John House, Courtauld Institute of Art; Uri Kupferschmidt, University of Haifa; Deborah Lenert, Barnes Foundation; Teresa Lignelli, Philadelphia Museum of Art; Connie Meyer, Dwight Foster Public Library; Joe Mikuliak, Philadelphia Museum of Art; Nicole R. Myers, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art; Monique Nonne, independent art historian; Kori Oberle, Hoard Historical Museum; Karen O’Connor, Hoard Historical Museum; Paola Ricciardi, Fitzwilliam Museum (formerly National Gallery of Art); Anne Roquebert, Musée d’Orsay; Ashok Roy, National Gallery; Marcia Steele, Cleveland Museum of Art; Clare Vasquez, Saint Louis Art Museum; and Guy Wildenstein and Joseph Baillio, Wildenstein and Co., New York. Thanks also to Iris Schaefer and Caroline von Saint-George, Wallraf-Richartz, for their guidance in shaping the technical report sections.

It has taken a veritable village of talented and supportive individuals to see this project through its first phase, and we happily anticipate that this community will expand exponentially as we venture into future volumes.
Gloria Groom
David and Mary Winton Green Curator of Nineteenth-Century European Painting and Sculpture
The Art Institute of Chicago

Contributors: Glossary:

Glossary1

À grain
By the late nineteenth century, commercially primed canvas—whether purchased ready-stretched or by the roll—was available in two principal thicknesses of ground application: à grain, indicating a single layer of ground; and , indicating two layers. À grain preparations retain more of the canvas texture than lisse applications.

Cross section
In this technique, a microscopic sample—including any combination of ground, paint, and surface layers—is taken, usually from the edge of a painting or an area of paint loss, and mounted in a transparent resin. The resin block, once hardened, is ground and polished, exposing all the constituent layers of the sample in one plane. Cross sections can be observed and documented with a microscope in reflected light and ultraviolet fluorescence; they can also be subjected to analysis with Scanning Electron Microscopy coupled with Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy (SEM/EDX), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and Raman instrumentation.

Foldover (turnover)
The crease made in a canvas where it is folded over stretcher or strainer bars. The original foldover corresponds to the first stretching of the canvas. If a canvas is mounted onto a new stretcher of slightly different dimensions, a new foldover is created.

Hardboard
A solid support made from pressed wood fibers.

ICA spring stretcher
The ICA (Intermuseum Conservation Association) stretcher, designed by Richard Buck in 1950, is the most common type of spring tension stretcher. It is constructed with spring-loaded corners intended to exert continuous, even tension on the canvas as it changes in response to fluctuations in humidity. The stretcher was available, under the name Superior Spring-Stretcher, until 2001.

Infrared reflectography (IRR)/infrared reflectogram
This technique exploits the varied transmission, absorption, and reflection properties of infrared radiation by artists’ materials. When the longer wavelengths of infrared radiation penetrate paint layers, the upper layers appear transparent. The degree of penetration depends on the thickness of the paint, the pigments used, and the wavelength of the infrared radiation. Many paints appear partially or completely transparent, while others, such as black, absorb the infrared radiation and appear dark. An infrared-sensitive camera captures the light reflecting off the surface of the painting. The resulting image is known as an infrared reflectogram. Infrared reflectography is used to distinguish pigments, inscriptions, underdrawings (particularly those done in carbon-rich materials such as charcoal and pencil over a white ground), and changes in a composition not visible to the naked eye.

Inpainting
Painting done by a conservator to restore areas of loss or damage in an original paint layer. Inpainting is limited to the area of loss and is carried out in a medium that remains readily distinguishable from the original, does not discolor, and can be easily removed in the future.

Lisse
By the late nineteenth century, commercially primed canvas—whether purchased ready-stretched or by the roll—was available in two principal thicknesses of ground application: , indicating a single layer of ground; and lisse, indicating two layers. A lisse (French for “smooth”) application fills the interstices of the canvas weave to a greater degree than à grain applications.

Polarized Light Microscopy (PLM)
This technique uses a light microscope with two polarizing filters (one above and the other below the specimen) to characterize the optical and morphological properties of a specific material. A minute sample is mounted on a glass slide, dispersed in a transparent medium, and examined in transmitted light. The microscopist studies the color, shape, size, sample homogeneity, refractive index, and other optical phenomena of pigments and fibers and how they interact with light. These observations, when compared to a database of reference materials, allow an experienced analyst to determine the individual pigment or fiber material present in a sample.

Pre-primed
Indicates a canvas of large dimensions that was primed before being cut to size and mounted on a stretcher. The presence of ground extending to the edges of the canvas is indicative of pre-priming. Canvases were sometimes pre-primed by an artist or assistant but, more commonly by the late nineteenth century, by commercial manufacturers who sold pre-primed canvas ready-stretched or in rolls for artists to stretch themselves.

Scanning Electron Microscopy coupled with Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy (SEM/EDX)/Backscattered Electron (BSE)
This technique utilizes electrons, rather than light, to create an image of a sample. It allows analysis of very small quantities of materials, which are normally coated with a thin film of carbon or gold. A small beam of electrons is focused on a material’s surface; secondary electrons allow scientists to obtain a three-dimensional image at very high magnification and resolution (up to 100,000x); backscattered electrons highlight the distribution of the elements, recording them in different shades of gray according to their atomic weight; and X-ray fluorescence emission allows analysts to determine which elements are present and to infer inorganic (mineral and synthetic) pigments and fillers. The EDX spectrum consists of a graph containing a series of peaks, each one occurring at a precise energy characteristic of a particular element. It is important to note that this technique gives information about what elements are present in a sample but not about their relationships to one another; it also does not indicate the organic compounds (such as binding medium) present. For these reasons, it is best complemented with Polarized Light Microscopy (PLM or a molecular fingerprinting technique such as Raman or Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. 

Standard-format supports: figure/paysage/marine
Refers to the range of ready-made commercial supports—canvas, panel, paper, and card—available in an array of fixed sizes that are constant regardless of manufacturer. Standard-size supports are numbered from 1 to 120 and available in three shapes: portrait (figure), landscape (paysage), and seascape (marine). These three formats have their longer dimension in common, with the short side becoming progressively shorter, so that the portrait format is the squarest, the seascape the narrowest, and the landscape between the two. The dimensions of these supports range from 12 to 130 by 22 to 195 cm.

Thread count
Researchers from the Thread Count Automation Project—including Dr. Rick Johnson of Cornell University, Dr. Don Johnson of Rice University, and Dr. Robert Erdmann of the University of Arizona—use a specially developed, automated software program that precisely counts the threads in a canvas and maps variations in the weave density from an X-radiograph. The results can provide information about weaving and priming processes and can be used to identify canvases cut from the same fabric.

Transmitted infrared (IR) imaging
This technique is similar to infrared reflectography (IRR), except that the infrared light source is placed behind the painting so that the light is transmitted through it, rather than reflected off its upper layers. It has proved especially useful in visualizing artists’ changes that are not visible in X-ray or IRR images, as well as original canvas stamps obscured from view as a result of lining.

Ultraviolet (UV) light/radiation/fluorescence
Invisible to the naked eye, ultraviolet (UV) radiation is located just beyond the violet band of visible light in the electromagnetic spectrum. Materials at the surface of a painting may exhibit characteristic fluorescence colors in response to ultraviolet radiation, depending on their chemical composition. For example, zinc oxide typically has a greenish-yellow fluorescence under ultraviolet light, while madder lake often displays a pinkish-orange fluorescence. UV fluorescence is visible to the naked eye and can be documented photographically. UV imaging is used to help verify or differentiate surface coatings, pigment composition, and reworkings or restorations, which can aid in their identification when coupled with other means of point analysis. UV light is also routinely used to study the fluorescence from constituent layers of cross sections under a microscope.

Warp-thread repair
A feature of a weft-angle map—generated by thread count automation software—that corresponds to a repair made to the warp thread of a canvas during the weaving process.

Wet-in-wet (wet-into-wet)
The application of wet paint onto a still-wet paint layer; the two paints may be blended or mixed together on the canvas. The presence of wet-in-wet paint application can be used to identify parts of a picture that were painted within a short timeframe.

Wet-on-wet
The application of wet paint onto a still-wet paint layer without mixing or blending the two paints.

Wet-over-dry
The application of wet paint onto a paint layer that has already dried or set up. This generally indicates some passage of time between the two applications.

X-radiography/X-radiograph/radio-transparent/radio-opaque
X-radiography involves exposing a painting to X-ray radiation and imaging the transmitted X-rays on film or digitally as an X-radiograph. Materials vary in their ability to absorb or transmit the radiation, depending on their thickness, density, and chemical composition. Materials of low atomic weight (for example, canvas), which are easily penetrated by X-rays, are described as radio-transparent and appear darker in X-radiographs. Materials of high atomic weight (for example, lead-white paint), which block X-rays, are called radio-opaque and appear lighter on film. X-radiography can reveal changes in composition, artist’s brushwork, damages, and details in the support not visible to the naked eye. Because all of the layers of the painting are superimposed on one plane, the reading of X-radiographs requires careful interpretation.

X-Ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy (XRF)
This noninvasive means of analysis utilizes a focused beam of X-rays to excite the atoms that constitute the artwork and successively analyze the fluorescence emitted by the investigated species. It provides a characteristic fingerprint of the elements contained in the sample area, thus allowing the identification of the work’s inorganic components (pigments, extenders, metallic elements, and the like, but not binding media or organic pigments).

Using This Catalogue:

Using the Catalogue

A short demonstration video on how to maximize the catalogue’s features and tools can be found here.

Disclaimer

Please note that this publication represents a limited presentation of the digital catalogue Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, one of the first two volumes in the series Paintings and Drawings by the Impressionist Circle in the Collection of the Art Institute of Chicago. At this time, only the entries for Claude Monet’s The Beach at Sainte-Adresse and Cliff Walk at Pourville are available, though the volume will eventually include our comprehensive holdings of works by this artist. Certain other sections of the catalogue, such as the collector pages, will also be further expanded in the future.

This preview publication is currently in a usability-testing period and only functions fully in up-to-date Chrome and Safari browsers. In order to completely access the “Contents” section on a laptop, use the two-finger scrolling option. A few functions, including the search feature, remain in the development stage.

We welcome your questions and comments about the publication at OnlineCatalogueFeedback@artic.edu. Please fill out a survey to let us know what you think here.

Citing the Catalogue

Due to the pioneering publishing platform of this catalogue, we are including the following citation guide for your reference.

Tombstone/Curatorial Entry

Gloria Groom and Jill Shaw, “Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Curatorial Entry,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

Technical Report

Kimberley Muir, “Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Technical Report,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

Provenance/Exhibition History/Selected References/Other Documentation

“Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Provenance,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Exhibition History,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Selected References,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“Cat. 13. The Beach at Sainte-Adresse: Other Documentation,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

Collectors

“Mrs. Lewis Larned (Annie Swan) Coburn,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

Director’s Statement/Introduction and Acknowledgments/Glossary/Using This Catalogue

“About This Catalogue: Director’s Statement,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“About This Catalogue: Introduction and Acknowledgments,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“About This Catalogue: Glossary,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

“About This Catalogue: Using This Catalogue,” in Monet Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, ed. Gloria Groom (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2011), para. X.

The Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative

The Art Institute of Chicago wishes to acknowledge the support of The Getty Foundation. Our project was undertaken as part of the Foundation's Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative, which includes a group of nine museums working together to develop models for the publication of scholarly collection catalogues in an online environment.

The Getty Foundation fulfills the philanthropic mission of the Getty Trust by supporting individuals and institutions committed to advancing the understanding and preservation of the visual arts locally and throughout the world. Through strategic grants and programs, the Foundation strengthens art history as a global discipline, promotes the interdisciplinary practice of conservation, increases access to museum and archival collections, and develops current and future leaders in the visual arts. The Foundation carries out its work in collaboration with the Getty Museum, Research Institute, and Conservation Institute to ensure that the Getty programs achieve maximum impact (fig. .1).

The Art Institute of Chicago’s Online Catalogue

This digital publication is powered by ChicagoCodeX (CCX), an open source suite of software tools which provides an authoring and publishing environment for online catalogues with full scholarly apparatus; intuitive book-like navigation; robust presentation tools for complex, multilayered images; and personalized reader annotation tools.

The Online Scholarly Catalogue Initiative team at the Art Institute of Chicago conceived and managed the project and the development of this suite of software tools. The project's impetus and funding came from The Getty Foundation. The coding and technical implementation was researched and executed by the IMA Lab.  The ChicagoCodeX (CCX) software will be released to the Drupal developer community shortly after the November 14, 2011 launch of this online catalogue preview site.

Footnote: <p> Several sources were particularly helpful in compiling this glossary: David Bomford, Jo Kirby, John Leighton, and Ashok Roy, <i>Art in the Making: Impressionism</i> (National Gallery/Yale University Press, 1990); Anthea Callen, <i>The Art of Impressionism: Painting Technique and the Making of Modernity</i> (Yale University Press, 2000); Iris Schaefer, Caroline von Saint-George, and Katja Lewerentz, <i>Painting Light: The Hidden Techniques of the Impressionists</i> (Skira, 2008); and American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works, <i>Painting Conservation Catalog. Vol. 2. Stretchers and Strainers</i> (Paintings Specialty Group of the AIC, 2008).</p>