What is Impressionism?Impressionism is a style of art that showcases natural light, movement, and moments.(more)See all videos for this articleAlthough oil landscapes had been painted at least since the 16th century, they usually were produced in the studio—recollections, rather than direct impressions, of observations of nature. The English painters and made small oil sketches out-of-doors before 1810, but it is unlikely that Monet knew these studies. He first visited Paris in 1859–60, where he was impressed by the work of the painters and . To his family’s annoyance, he refused to enroll in the . Instead, he frequented the haunts of advanced artists and worked at the Académie Suisse, an informal art school in Paris founded by Martin François Suisse, where he met . This informal training was interrupted by a call to military service; he served from 1861 to 1862 in , where he was excited by the African light and color. Monet’s choice of Algeria for service was perhaps a result of his admiration for the Romantic painter , whose coloristic work had been influenced by a visit to in 1832. In 1862 Monet returned to Le Havre, perhaps because of illness, and again painted the sea with Boudin, while also meeting the Dutch marine painter . Later that year he continued to study in Paris, this time with the academician , in whose atelier he met the artists , , and . After disagreements with their master, the group departed for the village of Chailly-en-Bière, near Barbizon in the forest of . It was also during this period—or at least before 1872—that Monet discovered prints, the decorativeness and flatness of which were to have a strong influence on the development of modern painting in ., Oscar-Claude Monet (UK: / ˈ m ɒ n eɪ /, US: / m oʊ ˈ n eɪ, m ə ˈ-/; French: [klod mɔnɛ]; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. [1], Claude Monet was a French painter who initiated, led, and unswervingly advocated for the Impressionist style. Monet is known for repeated studies of the same motif in different lights and for his Water Lilies series, which was inspired by his garden at Giverny..