Monet – Haystacks

If one focus on our Open Works project is the idea of interactivity, of intentionally giving some of the power of the work to a person who experiences it in space and time, then these haystacks by Claude Monet are an interesting early example. This series of 25 or so paintings, started in 1890, are a powerful reminder of the connection between representation and perception.

Connect this work to that of Olafur Eliasson whose installations demand that the viewer complete the work with their own perception.

While the focus here is primarily on the artist’s perception of changes in time, atmosphere, etc, when the images are displayed together they ask a viewer to make sense of those changes and to re-perceive them to some degree.