Joan MITCHELL: For the love of the landscape of VÉTHEUIL

" I bought this house because I loved the view, not because I loved Monet! "

" French artists have a sense of beauty - a sense of color - that is not allowed in New York. For me, painting is French.

Contrary to what may be said and written, Joan Mitchell did not settle in Vétheuil out of admiration for Monet and she was not shy about letting it be known (going so far as to nickname him "Monette" in derision)! When her mother died, Joan found herself with a large fortune and considered buying a house in the country. A friend of hers who owned a house in Chérence informed her of the sale of a beautiful property in Vétheuil. Joan Mitchell was won over by the property, its park and the extraordinary view of the Seine. She bought it. It so happened that the house that Monet had occupied below the house of La Tour housed the gardener of the property. This was the only link between Monet and Joan Mitchell in Vétheuil!

She moved to this house in 1967. She was for a long time the companion of the Canadian painter Jean-Paul Riopelle with whom relations were rather agitated until their separation and the return of Riopelle to Canada, but their bond remained very strong.

The village still remembers their exchanges in the room of the café of the square (the Chiquito) and the dinners in the restaurant "la pierre à poissons" or "grandpapa" which became their evening canteen (do not look for these restaurants in the village of Vétheuil, they do not exist anymore).

Joan Mitchell never represented the landscapes or the church of Vétheuil as such, but she was strongly impregnated by them to render sensations that she painted on canvas in an abstract expressionist style bursting with strength and color. She did not paint on the ground, but very often at night in her studio.

If we can speak of a filiation between Monet and Joan Mitchell, it could be imagined because of Monet's illness. Indeed, as cataracts deprived him of clear vision, the paintings he painted during this period became closer to an expressionist style by force of circumstance.

Joan Mitchell did not sign any of the paintings she did in France. She was bound by an exclusive contract to a New York gallery. She only signed her paintings in her New York studio when they were received.

Joan kept her residence in Vétheuil until the end of her life. She painted there in the company of her dogs.

The house known as "the tower

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The house cannot be visited.

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