France’s Claude Monet (1840-1926), the founder of Impressionism and the movement’s most prolific painter, reluctantly visited Venice, Italy, in October of 1908. At the time, he had grown disenchanted with the way his “Water Lilies” paintings were progressing. His dealer, Paul Durand-Ruel, rejected the work, leading Monet to cancel the show at the Paris gallery and to destroy many of the paintings in the series.