Coup de vent evokes Monet’s spectacular gift for expressing unbridled intensity and passion for color, light, and harmony. The bluff from which he painted commands the scene’s high ground and provides a plunging perspective of sloping and folding contours balanced by the flattened expanse of sea. While delicate atmospheric nuances grace the painting’s surface, the planar aspect of the sea conveys the Japonisme influence Monet had absorbed and incorporated into his compositions by this time. Nevertheless, it is the trees that transport the viewer to this windswept coast where they have stood since time immemorial under a constant barrage of the elements.

Still, inclement weather is only part of the story behind this painting, as Monet had not arrived at Trouville brimming with intention and resolve but with the weight and memories of past experiences. Trouville is where Boudin and Jongkind introduced him to landscape painting en plein air, and Monet had stayed here with his late-wife Camille and their young son Jean just before the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. So, the second anniversary of Camille’s death on 5 September likely preoccupied Monet while painting Coup de vent, as the piece was executed in late August or early September of this gloomy, ill-weathered trip.

Furthermore, Monet’s excursion to the Normandy coast was crafted to avoid further emotional discomfort at home. In 1877, Monet’s recently bankrupt friend, Ernest Hoschedé, moved his family into the Monets‘ Vétheuil home, but the two families’ cohabitation was complicated as Monet developed feelings for Ernest’s wife, Alice. By 1881, the two men could not tolerate each other’s presence. Ernest spent most of his time in Paris, while Alice remained in the countryside with Monet, who was now a widower, and their children. When Ernest Hoschedé would visit his family, Monet made a point to be elsewhere, as was the case on 28 August 1881 when Ernest arrived in Vétheuil for his son Jacques’ communion.

Although Monet was determined to avoid interacting with Ernest Hoschedé, he had become somewhat reliant on Alice’s company. It is no exaggeration that she was “essential in enabling Monet to avoid . . . pathological mourning and creative paralysis.” (Mary Mathews Gedo, Monet and His Muse: Camille Monet in the Artist’s Life, 2010, pp. 215-16). Grieving his first wife, Camille, and distraught by the separation from Alice, who was already widely regarded as Monet’s second wife, the blustery coast of Coup de vent is perhaps a representation of Monet’s emotional tumult.

Looking back, an appreciation of Monet’s environmental and emotional circumstances informs a full appreciation of Coup de vent. The combination of challenging weather and emotional strife resulted in a small but compelling group of four paintings, and Coup de vent is the only one of these four works that remains in private hands today. Durand-Ruel bought Coup de vent from Monet in 1883 and it was subsequently sold to the American Harris Whittemore collector in 1891. Whittemore, a close friend of Mary Cassat, would go on to develop an important collection of Impressionist masterpieces.