Bouquet of Sunflowers

Though Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh is the most famous artist to be associated with painting sunflowers, Frenchman Claude Monet's ‘Bouquet of Sunflowers', painted in 1881, pre-dates van Gogh's work. It seems likely that van Gogh, who saw this painting, was inspired to later paint sunflowers of his own.

The dark and light mix of the leaves is used intelligently and skillfully. The leaves nearest to the sunflowers themselves, being dark, emphasize the brightness of the flowers to an even greater extent.

Holding the flowers, the vase is delicately portrayed. The attention to detail is exquisite here, and notable because it displays Monet's attention to detail, rather than just focusing on the flowers alone – which are obviously the dominant subject of the painting. The rich color of the tablecloth also acts as a contrast to the light colored vase.

Helping the painting to make an impression is also the arrangement of the flowers themselves. They are positioned in a way that holds a viewer's attention, and Monet captures the different individual shades and shapes of the painting in their different positions impeccably.

One could be forgiven for not noticing the background of the painting at all, but this is also created in such a way that helps to make the sunflowers jump out off the canvas. There is a lilac/rosy glow around the flowers and table that almost acts as a relief effect.

The whole scene is articulated on this iron grille. It stresses the figures' opposing directions: the woman backed against it, facing keenly front; the girl turned away, faceless, looking through it into the picture's depths. Its vertical shafts cut against the curves of the girl's raised arm, and her belling skirt, and the elegant tricorn gap that forms between the figures.

The blankly simple design isolates the compact visual complexity of the young woman. She's a mass of accessories: her lap filled with cuffs, book, dog, fan, her big round buttons, her carefully spread hair, her bonnet with its floral crest. But these dense social signs are just facts, not clues. And the railings' hard, dark, grid, set against the bright dispersing steam, makes a point of maximum contrast – a keynote for a picture that is full of sharp edges and soft dissolves, of silhouettes and blurs.

The back of the girl's head and neck stands out against the billowing steam. Her elbow merges into it. One side of the woman's chin is boldly defined. The other sinks untraceably into the face. The picture has a cut-out, cartoon clarity that keeps slipping into uncertainty.