Following the global success of Beyond Van Gogh, the Wisconsin Center is holding the only active location of Beyond Monet: The Immersive Experience– with 1.5 million tickets sold. The exhibit is open on select days until Jan. 8, 2023, presenting over 400 works by the French Impressionist.
The untraditional exhibition style of this show begins guests in the Garden Gallery, a room inspired by “Monet’s Garden at Giverny,” where participants can stroll through phases of the artist’s life.
“People are very familiar with his work, with the paintings,” art historian Fanny Curtat said. “They know the images. They don’t know as much about him. With other figures like Van Gogh, his life events are so striking, and you know the ear cutting incident. With Monet, you know the water lilies. You know his work, but what else is there? What’s making him tick? What’s the purpose of his life? What’s the purpose of his work? How do they connect?”
A pathway out of the Garden Gallery leads to the prism, a tunnel-like room filled with strips of material that reflect changing colored lights. This transitional room attempts to immerse guests into the feeling of being beneath the surface of water and showcase the colors within Monet’s palette.
“It was very modern, at the time, for the impressionists to have this subjective point of view, to insist upon reality as changeable, as something that was never truly the same from one instant to the next,” Curtat said.
Monet, along with other impressionists of the 19th century, had to fight to share non confrontational moments of life. Until the success of the impressionist movement, there was no income to be made with this style of art. Artists needed to peel back social norms to reveal to viewers the still, tranquil beauty in their work.
The Infinity Room is the final area of the experience to explore. Once a guest has entered this space, with four walls and a floor covered with a 35 minute cycle of imagery from Monet’s work, they can immerse themselves into the flow of paintings.
The Infinity Room, and the experience in itself, was inspired by Monet’s own project. At the end of his life, he made a water lily cycle for the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and described it as an immersive experience, a place to lose yourself in this world without bearing.
“He designed himself the space in which these enormous paintings without frames were going to be, and he designed them into an infinity loop,” Curtat said. “They are two round rooms, forming an infinity symbol. They are lit from above, with natural light, and they are meant to bring people in, and I think that’s why people are still very fascinated by his work. It brings people in. It’s something that’s meant to be shared. It’s a moment — literally a moment that you’re sharing with him.”
