EST:£36.9M SOLD:£62.5M

DURING the last two decades of his career, Claude Monet devoted himself to painting the water-lily pond at his home in rural Giverny.

The Nymphéas series, 1914-17, was part of the culmination of these works and the most ambitious undertaking of his career: 22 mural-sized canvases completed just months before his death.

Monet did not exhibit any of these compositions during his lifetime. In comparison to his early work, Nymphéas en Fleur was painted with loose, expressive strokes and was much more daring in colour and composition.