La Japonesa

Camille Monet turns in a blaze of red silk, smiling over her shoulder, a blonde wig hiding her dark hair. Behind the playfulness lies a story of need, doubt and lasting debate.

The story behind the painting

Claude Monet painted La Japonaise in 1876, at a difficult moment. From 1874 he had fallen back into financial trouble, as support from the dealer Paul Durand-Ruel weakened and the costs of a new house mounted. Japonisme was fashionable in France, and Monet hoped this large, eye-catching canvas would sell well. His model was his first wife, Camille Doncieux, wearing a red kimono he borrowed from a friend. He showed it at the second Impressionist exhibition of 1876, alongside 18 other works, including Woman with a Parasol. Some think he also wanted to answer Édouard Manet's The Lady with the Fans.

What to look for

The canvas is huge, 231.8 by 142.3 centimetres. Camille stands on a tatami mat in a padded red uchikake, her body in profile and her face turned toward us, a gesture perhaps inspired by Japanese dance. Look at the robe: Monet placed the embroidered face of a stern samurai, gripping his sword, near the very centre of the canvas. Contrast him with Camille, blonde, smiling, holding a fan in the colours of the French flag. Behind her, uchiwa fans scatter across the wall; one, on a rosy background, shows a Japanese woman who seems to look back at Camille in astonishment.

Meaning and intent

The blonde wig is the key. By emphasising Camille as a European woman, the painting shows a performance of Japanese culture rather than an authentic Japanese setting; the Boston curators call it a witty comment on the Paris craze for all things Japanese. Critics in 1876 were divided. Émile Zola and Alexandre Pothey praised its innovation and bold colour, while others found it bizarre and read the samurai and Camille's expression as sexually suggestive. Monet's own feelings are unclear: he once called the kimono superb to paint, yet in 1918 said he was ashamed of having made the work to please the market.

Legacy

Monet's private doubts never settled the picture's reputation. In the twenty-first century the writer Julian Barnes called it ferociously awful, while the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where it now hangs, praises its virtuoso colour. In 2015 the museum's Kimono Wednesdays program, inviting visitors to pose in a replica kimono in front of the painting, drew protests over cultural appropriation and Orientalism. More than a century after Camille put on that borrowed robe, the painting still asks viewers what it means to dress up as someone else's culture. That question keeps the painting alive.