American Art Collaborative

In 1968, Joan Mitchell left Paris for the village of Vétheuil, northwest of the city, along the Seine. There she occupied a two-acre property with a view of both the river and abuilding once owned by the Impressionist Claude Monet. By this point in her career, Mitchell had drifted away from allover painting, and, as here, her most pronounced gestural activity and thickest impasto circled comparatively voided centers. Named for the ski resort where Frenchman Jean-Claude Killy earned three gold medals in the 1968 Winter Olympics, this canvas is certainly suggestive of snow cover where the white paint subdues purples evocative of Monet’s water lilies and ochres characteristic of Abstract Expressionism.