来年は印象派画家、クロード・モネが没して100年だそうで、東京のアーティゾン美術館で回顧展が開かれるそうです。没後100年が何を意味するか分かりませんが、ただ自分の人生の物差しと並べてみると、モネは私の曾祖父ぐらいの時代の画家で、意外に新しい感じがしました。
モネについて私の一番古い思い出は、中学の頃に「アルジャントゥイユの橋」を模写したことです。身近にあった本かカレンダーで絵を見つけたのか、授業の課題だったのか はっきりしませんが、ありあわせのべニア板に水彩絵の具で描いたので、前者だったと思います。水面に映った明るい空と森、光を浴びたヨットや橋が美しく、絵の具でこんな表現ができるのかと興味を惹かれたのだと思います。あとになってからですが、光の中だけでなく影の中の色彩の変化もきれいで、揺らいでいるようだと気づきました。そんなことを楽しく思い出しながら二度目の模写をしました。今度は小さいけれど新しいキャンバスで。
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Next year will be the 100th anniversary of the death of the Impressionist painter Claude Monet, and the Artizon Museum in Tokyo will be holding a retrospective exhibition. I'm not quite sure what a centenary of someone's death is supposed to signify, but when I compare that span of time to my own life, I realize Monet was active in the era of my great-grandfather, and that makes him feel surprisingly modern to me.
My earliest memory of Monet goes back to junior high school, when I copied The Bridge at Argenteuil. I no longer remember whether I found the painting in a book I had at home or whether it was assigned in class, but since I painted it in watercolor on a random sheet of plywood I had around, it was probably the former. I was drawn to the bright sky and trees reflected on the water, and to the sunlit boats and bridge—it amazed me that paint could express such beauty. I later noticed how lovely the changing colors are not only in the light but also in the shadows, as if everything were gently shimmering. With those pleasant memories in mind, I tried copying it again—this time on a small but fresh canvas.
I've been keeping my “Casual Sketches” going for a long time, but this will be the last sketch I post. My sincere thanks to everyone who has taken the time to look at my work.
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