CLAUDE MONET – “Le gare Saint Lazare (Saint Lazare Station)”, 1877 – oil on canvas, 75-100 cm. - Paris, Musée d'Orsay

"It's a pictorical symphony", observed the magazineL'homme libre when this painting was exhibited at the Third Impressionist Exhibition in 1877, one of the few positive critics to a painting in that show. "Monet likes this station, and he has already depicted it with less success. This time it is really wonderful. He has painted not only the movement, the colour and the activity, but also the noise. It's unforgettable".

CLAUDE MONET – "Impression, sunrise" (1873) - Paris, Musée Marmottan

“Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape", said of this canvas Louis Leroy, an Art critic, when the painted was exhibited at the first Impressionist exhibition in 1877. And this is just an example of how most of the critics of the time reacted to this painting, and, by extension, to the whole Impressionist movement (a movement that in fact owes its name to this painting) It is not surprising, then, that nobody offered 1,000 francs, the asking price for this painting.