Le pont de Waterloo, effet de soleil dans la brume

Monet's series of Waterloo Bridge paintings, executed from the same Savoy Hotel window as the Charing Cross Bridge works, is among the most ethereal bodies of work in his London campaigns of 1899–1901. This canvas, with its 'sunlight in the mist' effect, captures the specific phenomenon of diffuse winter sunlight penetrating the Thames fog to illuminate the bridge in a warm glow surrounded by cool atmospheric dissolution. The work, now in Caracas's Contemporary Art Museum, represents one of the more geographically distant homes for a painting in this series, reflecting the international collecting enthusiasm for Monet's London paintings that began with their Paris exhibition in 1904.

The bridge form is dissolved into a warm gold-ochre glow of atmospheric light, barely distinguishable from the surrounding fog except through tonal gradation. The handling is among Monet's most abstract in the London series, the paint surface building the atmospheric effect through opaque, closely valued color applied in multiple thin layers.