I recently ran a question survey via SurveyMonkey and Goodreads to discover people’s ‘most romantics’. For the question ‘Who is the most romantic artist?’, the results were as follows:

• Monet: 64%
• Renoir: 14%
• Da Vinci: 12%
• Van Gogh: 10%

The founder of Impressionist painting, Claude Monet, has topped the poll. It’s easy to see the appeal of Monet’s works – the colours, the brush strokes that lend a softness to the images, and the romanticism of the scenes depicted.

Monet lived in London, in Paris, in the Netherlands and finally in Giverny, Normandy, where he painted some of his most remembered works. He is well known for his paintings of his gardens in Giverny, including several of water lilies. One of my favourite paintings is Poppies Blooming, 1873; the child in me longs to walk down a hill among poppies so tall!

Interestingly, other polls to find the most romantic artist/artwork have had quite different results:

• The Art Fund charity found Paul Gauguin’s Nevermore to be Britain’s most romantic painting.
• Two years later, another poll by The Art Fund found Romeo and Juliet by Frank Bernard Dicksee to be Britain’s most romantic artwork.
• The Kiss by Gustav Klimt topped a poll for Valentine’s Day in America last year.

The point, I think, is that art appreciation comes down to personal taste. You may love Tate Modern; you may love Tate Britain; you may like both, or neither. But what is certain is that works of art have the capacity to arouse in us romantic sensibilities. We look at Monet’s Houses of Parliament, London and we are transported there; we can imagine ourselves in the scene, and it is a romantic experience.

The conclusion, therefore, is that if you are looking to kindle romance and daydreaming, your first port of call should be a museum or art gallery. But you’d have to travel far afield to see all of Monet’s works, so instead, take a look at this gallery: http://www.intermonet.com/oeuvre/.