Guy Rose was not only instrumental in introducing California to impressionism, but he was also considered the state’s premier artist in this style. Throughout his career, he worked periodically in Giverny—one of many American and international artists who gravitated to the French village, about fifty miles northwest of Paris, that was home to Claude Monet (1840–1926). In Rose’s quiet landscape, the expanse of hillside, painted with delicate lines and individual brushstrokes to represent the grassy surface, rises to a bright but overcast sky, truncating the view of another hill in the distance. The painting represents the hills behind the village where residents maintained vegetable fields, which the artist indicated by variegated patches. Giverny Hillside is experimental in its dramatic simplicity, casual composition, and lack of narrative. Asymmetrical and starkly two-dimensional, the composition suggests the influence of Japanese aesthetics.

Learn more about this painting on the Terra Foundation website.