Red Boats at Argenteuil was painted by Claude Monet in 1875. It depicts boats getting ready to set out on the lake at Argenteuil, a suburb of Paris to which Monet himself moved with his family in 1871.

Monet returned to France from London in 1872 and settled in Argenteuil (a town on a picturesque stretch of the Seine, eleven kilometres from central Paris), where he lived until 1876. His contemporaries Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Édouard Manet and Alfred Sisley joined him and, for a time, Argenteuil became a hub of artistic activity. It was during this time that Monet created some of his most characteristic paintings. In order to observe the effects of sunlight on water more closely, Monet often worked from a boat-turned-studio. In Argenteuil, the rust-red boats, painted in contrasting colours to the blue water and sky and the green water plants, are depicted surrounded by shimmering light – perhaps the true subject of the painting art.

At the center of the Monet painting, we see a number of sail boats moored just off the banks of the lake. A person can be seen on one of the larger boats while a few spectators are standing on the bank. It is a beautiful summer day in Argenteuil, a blue sky and only a few small clouds. However, the early morning mist contributes to make the sky slightly grey.

What is truly remarkable in this painting is what way the water, and the reflection of the sky and boats in the water, are depicted. Monet truly captures this, including how it is distorted at some points by small waves. As the reflection deals with the characteristics of light and how light is depicted, the reflection is not only proof of Monet’s immense skill but also offer the promise of things yet to come, as Monet later delve deeper into the depiction of light with e.g. his Haystacks.

Red Boats at Argenteuil can today be seen at the the Musee de l'Orangerie in Paris, France. This painting was one of Domenica Walter's last acquisitions (c.1955), reflecting her particular interest in Impressionism paintings.