This painting and "The Beach at Sainte-Adresse" (Art Institute of Chicago) were probably conceived as a pair. They are identical in size, and the point of view differs by only a few yards. Sainte-Adresse, the well-to-do suburb of Le Havre, was the home of Monet's father. Destitute, Monet spent the summer of 1867 with his father and his aunt Sophie Lecadre at the cost of abandoning his companion, Camille Doncieux, and their newborn son, Jean. Monet attended his birth in Paris on August 8 and returned to Sainte-Adresse on August 12.

The pair of paintings juxtaposes this sunny regatta, watched at high tide by well-dressed bourgeois, with an overcast scene at low tide, showing fishing boats hauled onto the beach peopled with sailors and workers. Since Monet never exhibited the paintings side by side, the contrast between them was not intended as a social manifesto but instead reflected differing conditions under which the same scene, convenient to his father's house, could be observed.

Inscription: Signed (lower left): Claude Monet

?Henri Hecht, Paris (1873; bought in January for Fr 500 from the artist); ?sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, April 5, 1884, no. 25, as "Sainte-Adresse"; [Durand-Ruel, Paris, about 1888–91, sold on August 20, 1891 to Widener]; P. A. B. Widener, Ashbourne, near Philadelphia (1891–1907; sold on February 27, 1907 to Durand-Ruel); [Durand-Ruel, New York, 1907]; William Church Osborn, New York (1907–d. 1951)

Galerie de la société des amis des arts de Bordeaux. "Salon des amis des arts de Bordeaux," 1868, no. 449 (as "Les régates du Havre") [possibly this picture; see Ref. Wildenstein 1996, vol. 2].

London. Durand-Ruel. "Society of French Artists: Eighth Exhibition," Spring 1874, no. 142 (as "Ste Adresse near Havre," possibly this picture).

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Loan Exhibition of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings," May 3–September 15, 1921, no. 76 (as "Plage de Sainte Adresse," lent by William Church Osborn).

New York. Durand-Ruel. "Loan Exhibition of French Masterpieces of the Late XIX Century," March 20–April 10, 1928, no. 12 (as "Ste. Adresse," lent anonymously).

New York. Durand-Ruel. "Exhibition of Masterpieces by Claude Monet Commemorating the Hundred and Thirtieth Anniversary of the House of Durand-Ruel 1803-1933," March 20–April 15, 1933, no. 12 (as "La plage de Ste. Adresse," 1869, lent by a private collection).

San Francisco. Palace of Fine Arts. "Golden Gate International Exposition," 1940, no. 284 (lent by William Church Osborn).

New York. Wildenstein. "A Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Claude Monet for the Benefit of the Children of Giverny," April 11–May 12, 1945, no. 4 (as "La Plage de Sainte Adresse," c. 1865, lent by William Church Osborn).

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Painter's Light," October 5–November 10, 1971, no. 29.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Impressionism: A Centenary Exhibition," December 12, 1974–February 10, 1975, not in catalogue.

Paris. Grand Palais. "Hommage à Claude Monet (1840-1926)," February 8–May 5, 1980, no. 16 (as "Les régates à Sainte-Adresse").

Paris. Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais. "Impressionnisme: Les origines, 1859–1869," April 19–August 8, 1994, no. 135.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Origins of Impressionism," September 27, 1994–January 8, 1995, no. 135.

Art Institute of Chicago. "Claude Monet, 1840–1926," July 22–November 26, 1995, no. 13.

Glasgow Art Gallery and Museum, Glasgow. McLellan Galleries. "The Birth of Impressionism: From Constable to Monet," May 23–September 7, 1997, unnumbered cat.

Moscow. State Pushkin Museum. "Claude Monet," November 26, 2001–February 10, 2002, no. 4 (as "Les Régates à Saint-Adresse" [sic]).

St. Petersburg. State Hermitage Museum. "Claude Monet," March 1–May 15, 2002, no. 4 (as "Les Régates à Saint-Adresse" [sic]).

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. "Monet in Normandy," June 17–September 17, 2006, no. 4.

Raleigh. North Carolina Museum of Art. "Monet in Normandy," October 15, 2006–January 14, 2007, no. 4.

Cleveland Museum of Art. "Monet in Normandy," February 18–May 20, 2007, no. 4.

London. Royal Academy of Arts. "Impressionists by the Sea," July 7–September 30, 2007, no. 33.

Washington. Phillips Collection. "Impressionists by the Sea," October 20, 2007–January 13, 2008, no. 33.

Hartford. Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art. "Impressionists by the Sea," February 9–May 11, 2008, no. 33.

Claude Monet. Letter to Frédéric Bazille. June 25, 1867 [published in Gaston Poulain, "Bazille et ses amis," Paris, 1932, p. 92].

Times (April 27, 1874) [reprinted in Kate Flint, ed., "Impressionists in England: The Critical Reception," London, 1984, p. 35].

Catalogue of Paintings Forming the Private Collection of P. A. B. Widener, Ashbourne, near Philadelphia. [Paris], 1885–1900, vol. 1, p. 84, mistakenly describes it in reverse.

Théodore Duret. "Claude Monet und der Impressionismus." Kunst und Künstler 2 (March 1904), p. 243, ill. [see Ref. Wildenstein 1974].

Emil Waldmann. "Französische Bilder in amerikanischem Privatbesitz II." Kunst und Künstler 9 (December 1910), ill. p. 140.

Gustave Geffroy. "Claude Monet." L'Art et les artistes, n.s., 2 (October 1920–February 1921), ill. p. 61.

André Fontainas and Louis Vauxcelles. Histoire générale de l'art français de la Révolution à nos jours. 1, Paris, 1922, ill. p. 132.

Louis Vauxcelles. "Claude Monet." L'Amour de l'art 3 (August 1922), ill. p. 232.

Camille Mauclair. Claude Monet. London, [1925], p. 42, pl. 8 [French ed., Paris, 1924, p. 36, pl. 8].

François Fosca. Claude Monet. Paris, 1927, ill. opp. p. 60.

Georges Grappe. "Claude Monet." L'art vivant 3 (January 1, 1927), ill. p. 7.

Marthe de Fels. La Vie de Claude Monet. Paris, 1929, p. 237.

Ralph Flint. "Monet Anniversary Exhibition." Art News (March 18, 1933), p. 5, ill. p. 3, dates it 1869.

George Besson. Claude Monet (1840–1926). Paris, [194–], pl. 18.

Maurice Malingue. Claude Monet. Monaco, 1943, pp. 23, 145, pl. 44, dates it 1866; identifies the standing person with the cane as Monet's father.

John Rewald. The History of Impressionism. New York, 1946, p. 156, prints part of a letter from Monet to Bazille that mentions it.

Oscar Reuterswärd. Monet. Stockholm, 1948, p. 281.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art Miniatures, French Impressionists: Manet, Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, and Boudin. 27, Album 51, New York, 1951, unpaginated, ill. (color).

Theodore Rousseau Jr. "Reports of the Departments: Paintings." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 11 (Summer 1952), pp. 32–33, ill.

Theodore Rousseau Jr. "A Guide to the Picture Galleries." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 12, part 2 (January 1954), ill. p. 53.

Charles Merrill Mount. Monet, a biography. New York, 1966, pp. 144, 407, claims that Monet used his father and aunt for some of the figures on the beach.

Joel Isaacson. "The Early Paintings of Claude Monet." PhD diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1967, pp. xii, 183–85, 203, 243, pl. 63.

Charles Sterling and Margaretta M. Salinger. "XIX–XX Centuries." French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 3, New York, 1967, pp. 125–26, ill.

Margaretta M. Salinger. "Windows Open to Nature." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 27 (Summer 1968), unpaginated, ill.

Douglas Cooper. "The Monets in the Metropolitan Museum." Metropolitan Museum Journal 3 (1970), pp. 281, 285–86, 302–3, 305, fig. 5.

Kermit Swiler Champa. Studies in Early Impressionism. New Haven, 1973, pp. 19–20, fig. 25, discusses the composition and handling in relation to the other version at the Art Institute of Chicago (W92); dates both works to autumn 1867.

John Rewald. The History of Impressionism. 4th rev. ed. New York, 1973, pp. 179–80, prints part of a letter from Monet to Bazille that mentions it.

Carl R. Baldwin The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Impressionist Epoch. [New York], 1974, p. 15.

Daniel Wildenstein. "1840–1881: Peintures." Claude Monet: Biographie et catalogue raisonné. 1, Lausanne, 1974, pp. 38, 47, 162–63, no. 91, ill., dates it June 1867 in accordance with a letter of that date from Monet to Bazille describing this composition; tentatively adds to the early provenance of the work; identifies Monet's father as one of the figures on the beach.

Margaretta Salinger in "The Price Was Not Too High." The Chase, the Capture: Collecting at the Metropolitan. New York, 1975, p. 204.

Alice Bellony-Rewald. The Lost World of the Impressionists. London, 1976, p. 62.

Anne Distel. Hommage à Claude Monet (1840–1926). Exh. cat., Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais. Paris, 1980, pp. 80–82, no. 16, ill., dates it about 1867; includes it in the 1874 London exhibition.

Anne Distel. "Albert Hecht, collectionneur (1842–1889)." Bulletin de la Société de l'Histoire de l'Art Français (1981), p. 279.

Paul Hayes Tucker. Monet at Argenteuil. New Haven, 1982, p. 92, fig. 62.

Robert Gordon and Andrew Forge. Monet. New York, 1983, p. 289, ill. p. 34 (color).

Charles S. Moffett in Manet, 1832–1883. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1983, p. 67 [French ed., Paris, 1983].

Richard Shiff. Cézanne and the End of Impressionism. Chicago, 1984, pp. 108–10, fig. 20.

John House in Claude Monet: Painter of Light. Exh. cat., Auckland City Art Gallery. Auckland, New Zealand, 1985, p. 12, fig. 4.

Charles S. Moffett. Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1985, pp. 10, 108–9, 251, ill. (color).

Shunsuke Kijima. Monet. Tokyo, 1985, unpaginated, fig. 5 (color).

Richard R. Brettell. French Impressionists. Chicago, 1987, p. 11, compares it to the other depiction of this beach (Art Institute of Chicago) of the same size and painted in the same year, stating that "although there is no documentary evidence that they were intended as a pair, they both seem to contrast the modern bourgeois world of suburban Sainte-Adresse and the traditional working world of the fishing village from which it had evolved".

Douglas Skeggs. River of Light: Monet's Impressions of the Seine. New York, 1987, pp. 37–38, ill. (color).

Gary Tinterow et al. "Modern Europe." The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 8, New York, 1987, pp. 8, 30–31, colorpl. 15.

Robert L. Herbert. Impressionism: Art, Leisure, and Parisian Society. New Haven, 1988, pp. 284, 290, colorpl. 294.

Monet by Himself. London, 1989, ill. p. 42 (color).

Karin Sagner-Düchting. Claude Monet, 1840–1926: Ein Fest für die Augen. Cologne, 1990, pp. 37–38, ill. (color).

Michael F. Zimmermann. Seurat and the Art Theory of His Time. Antwerp, 1991, p. 398, colorpl. 543.

Robert L. Herbert. Monet on the Normandy Coast: Tourism and Painting, 1867–1886. New Haven, 1994, pp. 11, 13, 15–16, figs. 14, 36 (color, overall and detail).

John House. "Paris and New York: Origins of Impressionism." Burlington Magazine 136 (October 1994), p. 722, fig. 79.

Gary Tinterow in Gary Tinterow and Henri Loyrette. Origins of Impressionism. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1994, pp. 66, 296, 432–33, no. 135, ill. p. 432 and fig. 87 (color) [French ed., "Impressionnisme: Les origines, 1859–1869," Paris, 1994], states that this painting and "The Beach at Sainte-Adresse" (Art Institute of Chicago) were conceived as a pair, dating both works to 1867; notes that both works are identical in size, and that the point of view differs only by a few meters.

Gary Tinterow and Henri Loyrette. Origins of Impressionism. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1994, pp. 296, 432–33, no. 135, ill., states that this painting and "The Beach at Sainte-Adresse" (Art Institute of Chicago) were conceived as a pair, dating both works to 1867; notes that both works are identical in size, and that the point of view differs only by a few meters.

Albert Kostenevich. Hidden Treasures Revealed: Impressionist Masterpieces and Other Important French Paintings Preserved by the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. Exh. cat.New York, 1995, p. 132.

Joachim Pissarro. "Monet at the Art Institute of Chicago." Apollo 142 (December 1995), p. 63, calls it a variation on "The Garden at Sainte-Adresse" (MMA 67.241), which he calls "the beginnings of serial painting".

Charles F. Stuckey. Claude Monet, 1840–1926. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, 1995, p. 35, no. 13, ill. (color).

Paul Hayes Tucker. Claude Monet: Life and Art. New Haven, 1995, pp. 26–27, colorpl. 37.

Eliza E. Rathbone in Impressionists on the Seine: A Celebration of Renoir's "Luncheon of the Boating Party". Exh. cat., Phillips Collection. Washington, 1996, p. 17, fig. 2.

Daniel Wildenstein. "Catalogue raisonné–Werkverzeichnis: Nos. 1–968." Monet. 2, 2nd ed. Cologne, 1996, pp. 48–49, no. 91, ill. (color).

Daniel Wildenstein. Monet or the Triumph of Impressionism. 1, 2nd ed. Cologne, 1996, p. 68, ill. p. 62 (color).

Belinda Thomson. "The Birth of Impressionism, Glasgow." Burlington Magazine 139 (August 1997), p. 562, fig. 44.

Dianne W. Pitman in Monet & Bazille: A Collaboration. Exh. cat., High Museum of Art. Atlanta, 1998, pp. 53, 55, 64 n. 39, fig. 27 (color).

Guido Guiffrè in La nascita dell'impressionismo. Exh. cat., Casa dei Carraresi, Treviso. Conegliano, Italy, 2000, pp. 273–74, ill.

Rebecca A. Rabinow. "Modern Art Comes to the Metropolitan: The 1921 Exhibition of 'Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings'." Apollo 152 (October 2000), p. 11.

Esmée Quodbach. "'The Last of the American Versailles': The Widener Collection at Lynnewood Hall." Simiolus 29, no. 1/2 (2002), pp. 57, 59, fig. 13.

John Leighton in Juliet Wilson-Bareau David Degener. Manet and the Sea. Exh. cat., Art Institute of Chicago. Philadelphia, 2003, p. 215.

Amy Barker et al. Boudin, Monet, and the Sea Painters of Normandy. Exh. cat., Bowes Museum. County Durham, England, 2004, p. 30.

Eric M. Zafran. "Monet in the United States: The Early Years." Claude Monet–A Hymn to Light. Exh. cat., Hiroshima Prefectural Museum. 2004, p. 194.

Richard Brettell in Monet in Normandy. Exh. cat., Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. New York, 2006, p. 43.

Heather Lemonedes in Monet in Normandy. Exh. cat., Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. New York, 2006, pp. 58–61, 183, no. 4, ill. (color, overall and detail).

Joseph Baillio and Cora Michael in Claude Monet (1840–1926): A Tribute to Daniel Wildenstein and Katia Granoff. Exh. cat., Wildenstein & Co., Inc. New York, 2007, pp. 185, 214 n. 21, fig. 4 (color).

John House. Impressionists by the Sea. Exh. cat., Royal Academy of Arts. London, 2007, pp. 23–24, 75, 125, 130–32, no. 33, ill. pp. 77, 130 (color).

Gary Tinterow in Masterpieces of European Painting, 1800–1920, in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2007, pp. 136, 280–81, no. 125, ill. (color and black and white).

Eric M. Zafran in Claude Monet (1840–1926): A Tribute to Daniel Wildenstein and Katia Granoff. Exh. cat., Wildenstein & Co., Inc. New York, 2007, pp. 96, 110.

Christine I. Oaklander. "Jonathan Sturges, W. H. Osborn, and William Church Osborn: A Chapter in American Art Patronage." Metropolitan Museum Journal 43 (2008), pp. 188–89, 191, fig. 27 (color).

Joseph Baillio in Claude Monet: 1840–1926. Exh. cat., Galeries nationales, Grand Palais. Paris, 2010, pp. 54, 57, identifies the man in the gray suit and straw hat as Monet's father and the three other figures as probably members of the Lecadre family.

John House in Claude Monet: 1840–1926. Exh. cat., Galeries nationales, Grand Palais. Paris, 2010, p. 21, fig. 1 (color).

This picture is closely related in composition and treatment to a painting of the same site dated 1867 in the Art Institute of Chicago.