October Newsletter: Monet, vision & his contemporaries

Imagine this.  It’s 1912 and you’ve been told you have cataracts in both eyes. Doctors can surgically remove them, but it’s risky. In fact, one of your friends, another artist, has received the same news.  She eventually goes for cataract surgery and several treatments, but all fail. What would you do?

That’s the dilemma that Claude Monet (1840-1926) faced. Early in the 1900s, Monet noticed his eyes failing. Since he was experiencing the beginning of cataracts, his vision was probably a little bit blurrier and colors didn’t seem quite right. As one doctor has told me, cataracts are like looking through dirty lenses—you can see but it’s a struggle.

Ten years later Monet did have the feared surgery and successfully was able to see and paint until his death in 1926. He destroyed a lot the paintings he created before the surgery. But we do have some available. Below you will see the painting of the bridge at Giverney, his beloved home outside Paris, before his cataracts and after.

You can see what happened. He had difficulty seeing—thus the broad brush stroke and the reddish browns. Before surgery, Monet resorted to reading the labels on his paint tubes and memorizing where the colors were placed on his palette. It didn’t seem to work. After surgery he was able to see like never before and some say he even saw in ultra-violet.

Three of Monet’s contemporaries were also having eye trouble: Mary Cassatt (1844-1926), Edgar Degas (1834-1917) and Camille Pissarro (1830-1903).  

Mary Cassatt was diagnosed with cataracts the same year as Monet and went on to have surgery and several treatments, which eventually left her blind. Her diabetes probably didn’t help either. She switched from oil painting to pastels, as her friend Degas did, because it allowed for rougher lines and expression. In the paintings below, you can see the difference between the paintings Cassatt did before being affected by cataracts and then after.

Degas started to experience problems after serving in the Franco-Prussian war. A victim of a retinal disease, Degas eyesight continued to decrease throughout the next 30 odd years. You can also see the difference in his paintings as his disease progressed.

Camille Pissarro suffered chronic infection of the tear sac in his right eye and had a very hard time painting en plein air (outside). Many of his later cityscapes were painted behind windows.

I find this subject of interest right now as I’m going to have cataract surgery myself. I’ve been told that it may have been caused by the steroids and chemo I had or just aging itself. The longer we live, the more likely we will have eye trouble. In the case of Monet and Cassatt, they both lived into their 80s. Although this age may not seem too outlandish today, back then when the life expectancy was far lower, this age was amazing. So it’s not that surprising, they fell victim to problems with eyesight. Today we are so lucky because as we age, cataract surgery has been refined and it's success rate is stunningly high.