Boy in the Country

This energetic study comes from a sketchbook that Monet kept when he was no more than 17 years old. Since none of his paintings from this period survive, the work offers a rare glimpse of his early talent. His chosen subject—perhaps a native of his coastal hometown, Le Havre—could well have been captured spontaneously. The boy’s clothing obscures his anatomy, but the outlines of his smock are crisp and decisive. It seems as if the artist applied considerable pressure to the pencil. In describing the tufts of grass, he appears to have indented the page.