Stack of Wheat (Thaw, Sunset)
Claude Monet (French, 1840–1926)1890–91
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Materials & printing
Archival matte paper, 189 g/m² (10.3 mil), sourced from Japan, printed with multicolor water-based inkjet so every brushstroke stays crisp. Framed prints arrive ready to hang in a .75″ ayous-wood frame with an acrylite front. Sized to standard frames by cropping, never stretching — at most about 3% comes off one edge, which isn’t noticeable on most pieces, and we only offer a size when it stays that small.
Shipping & returns
Made to order and delivered in 5–8 business days (2–4 to print, 3–4 in transit). US shipping only for now. Because each print is made for your order, all sales are final — but if it arrives damaged or defective, send us a photo within 14 days and we’ll replace it free. Full policy.
Why is it this affordable?
A thin, flat margin on every piece — just enough to keep the store running. Most of what you pay is the print itself. We only sell sizes that reproduce at full quality, and we don’t mark up the large sizes the way most shops do.
About this work
The monumental stacks that Claude Monet depicted in his series Stacks of Wheat rose fifteen to twenty feet and stood just outside the artist’s farmhouse at Giverny. Through 1890 and 1891, he worked on this series both in the field, painting simultaneously at several easels, and in the studio, refining pictorial harmonies. In May 1891, Monet hung fifteen of these canvases next to each other in one small room in the Galerie Durand-Ruel in Paris. An unprecedented critical and financial success, the exhibition marked a breakthrough in Monet’s career, as well as in the history of French art. In this view, and in nearly all of the autumn views in the series, the conical tops of the stacks break the horizon and push into the sky. But in most of the winter views, which constitute the core of the series, the stacks seem wrapped by bands of hill and field, as if bedded down for the season. For Monet, the stack was a resonant symbol of sustenance and survival. He followed this group with further series depicting poplars, the facade of Rouen Cathedral, and, later, his own garden at Giverny. The Art Institute has the largest group of Monet’s Stacks of Wheat in the world.
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 64.4 × 92.5 cm (25 3/8 × 36 7/16 in.)
Museum record · 4 owners · 24 exhibitions
Provenance
- The artist (d. 1926); possibly sold to "Hamman," the director of Roland Knoedler’s gallery, Paris, as agent for Knoedler and Company, New York, Sept. 1891; sold at the Knoedler, New York, sale, Chickering Hall, New York, Apr. 11, 1893, lot 77, to Durand-Ruel, New York, and Boussod, Valadon et Cie., Paris, in half-shares, for 6,000 francs; half share sold by Durand-Ruel, New York, to Durand-Ruel, Paris, Sept. 30, 1899 or Nov. 13, 1899; half share sold to Boussod, Valadon et Cie., Paris, May 27, 1903.
- Rosenberg, Paris, 1903; sold to Durand-Ruel, Paris, Jan. 11, 1908; sold to Durand-Ruel, New York, Nov. 11, 1915 or Dec. 9, 1915; sold to André Weil, Paris, Jan. 9, 1948.
- Wildenstein, New York and Paris, by 1982; sold to Mercedes Eraso de Rodríguez Landaeta, Caracas, Venezuela, by 1982.
- Rachel Adler Fine Art, New York, by Aug. 1982; sold to James Goodman Gallery, New York, Aug. 1982; sold to Stephen Hahn Gallery, New York, Feb. 7, 1983; half share sold to Acquavella Galleries, New York, Feb. 7, 1983; sold to Daniel C. Searle, Winnetka, Ill., Feb. 7, 1983; given by Mr. and Mrs. Daniel C. Searle, Winnetka, Ill., to the Art Institute of Chicago, beginning in 1983.
Exhibitions
- Possibly Paris, Galeries Durand-Ruel, Exposition d’oeuvres récentes de Claude Monet, May 1891, as Meule.
- (Fin du jour.).
- New York, Fine Arts Society Building, Loan Exhibition, Feb. 1893, as The Haystack —Thaw.
- Lent by Mr. M. Knoedler.
- New York, Durand-Ruel Galleries, Exposition of Forty Paintings by Claude Monet, Jan. 12–27, 1895, as “Meule—Dégel—Soleil couchant.” 1891.
- Boston, St. Botolph Club, Exhibition of Paintings by Claude Monet, Feb. 4–16, 1895, as Meule.
- Le Degel.
- Soleil couchant.
- Munich, Kunstausstellungsgebäude, Internationalen Kunst-Ausstellung: Secession, 1900, as Heuschober.
- Untergehende Sonne.
- Berlin, Paul Cassirer, XI. Jahrgang.
- VI Ausstellung, Jan. 22–Feb. 22, 1909, as Heuschober bei Sonnenuntergang.
- Copenhagen, Musée Royal de Copenhague, Exposition d’art français du XIXe siècle, May 15–June 30, 1914, as Höstak.
- Solnedgant.—Meule: soleil couchant (1891).
- Galeries Durand-Ruel.
- Possibly Paris, Galeries Durand-Ruel, Tableaux par Claude Monet, Mar. 2–28, 1914, as Meules, soleil couchant.
- Arts Club of Chicago, Paintings by Cl.
- Monet in Retrospect 1868–1913, Jan. 6–31, 1933.
- Los Angeles County Museum of Art, A Day in the Country: Impressionism and the French Landscape, June 28–Sept. 16, 1984; Art Institute of Chicago, Oct. 23, 1984–Jan. 6, 1985; Paris, Galeries Nationales, Grand Palais, as L’impressionnisme et le paysage français, Feb. 4–Apr. 22, 1985 (Los Angeles and Chicago only).
- Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Monet in the ’90s: The Series Paintings, February 7–April 29, 1990; Art Institute of Chicago, May 19–August 12, 1990; London, Royal Academy of Arts, September 7–December 9, 1990.
- Art Institute of Chicago, Claude Monet, 1840–1926, July 22–Nov. 26, 1995.
- Moscow, State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Klod Mone, Nov. 26, 2001–Feb. 21, 2002; Saint Petersburg, State Hermitage Museum, May 1–15, 2002.
- Fort Worth, Tex., Kimbell Art Museum, The Impressionists: Master Paintings from the Art Institute of Chicago, June 29–Nov. 2, 2008.
- Art Institute of Chicago, Monet and Chicago, September 5, 2020-June 14, 2021.


