Claude Monet, "Regatta at Sainte-Adresse"

Claude Monet, Regatta at Sainte-Adresse, 1867; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Look at the beautiful, naturalistic tones of this famous Monet painting. Billowy clouds, subtly variegated sea colors revealing the changing ocean depths, the shadows on the sand, and so on. The harshly altered reproduction below has turned everything a bit green, removed a lot of the detail, and added blotches where there should be greater substance and more clearly defined features. There's no need for it, either — an excellent photo is quickly available at the museum's site, and there are other accurate photos online in various locations. The photo of the painting on display was taken by a museum visitor in 2010.

The Met also offers some background and insight into Monet's intentions with this painting:

Monet spent the summer of 1867 at Sainte-Adresse, a well-to-do suburb of Le Havre on the Normandy Coast. On June 25, he reported that he had about twenty pictures under way, noting, 'Among the seascapes I am doing the regattas of Le Havre with many figures on the beach and the outer harbor covered with small sails.' This sunny regatta, watched at high tide by well-dressed bourgeois, seems to have been conceived as a pair with The Beach at Sainte-Adresse (Art Institute of Chicago), an overcast scene at low tide, showing fishing boats hauled onto the beach, peopled with sailors and workers.

Altered version of a painting by Claude Monet.