FENG J sculpture ENTERS THE COLLECTION OF THE GIVERNY museum

A Tribute to Claude Monet and the Language of Impressionism, Rêverie à Giverny will be unveiled in a major exhibition marking the centenary of the French Master’s death.

By Isabel Jiménez

A sculpture by Feng J – the young Chinese artist jeweller known for her impressionist inspired high jewellery creations – will enter the collection of the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny this spring. A tribute to Claude Monet (1840-1926) and the language of Impressionism, Rêverie à Giverny will be unveiled in a major exhibition marking the 100th anniversary of Monet’s passing on 5 December 1926. Before the Water Lilies. Monet Discovers Giverny, 1883–1890 will run from 27 March until 5 July 2026.

Located an hour from Paris, on the edge of Monet’s house and gardens in Giverny, the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny founded in 2009 is standing on a hillside at the very spot where the French master painted his celebrated Haystacks series in the 1890s. Earlier, the museum has presented major exhibitions devoted to Pierre Bonnard, Maurice Denis, Edgar Degas, Joaquín Sorolla and Gustave Caillebotte, and now piece by Feng J will be presented to the visitors. ​Marking the centenary of Claude Monet’s passing Before the Water Lilies. Monet discovers Giverny, 1883-1890 show traces the artist’s early years in the village of Giverny, from his arrival in 1883 to the end of 1890, when he became the owner of his house and began designing his garden.

Inspired by Feng J’s visit to the French museum in the summer of 2025, her latest work to be exhibited there is, crafted in titanium/ bronze and being electroplated coloring on surface, mount coloured crystals inside the wings frames-depicts a stylised dragonfly, one of the jeweller’s signature motifs. Drawing on a symbol deeply rooted in traditional Chinese iconography, Feng J’s “libellule” also pays a poetic homage to Monet’s water lilies, “Encountering Monet’s work as a child in Hangzhou - and later studying it at the China Academy of Art - was an aesthetic shock. It has stayed with me ever since, and today Monet’s language of light and colour lies at the very foundation of my practice,” said Feng J.

In addition to Rêverie in Giverny, Feng J is currently developing an artistic high jewellery creation directly inspired by a monumental oil on canvas in the collection of the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny, Nymphéas avec rameaux de saule, Feng J explains, “It is therefore an extraordinary honour to see my sculpture—my first real departure from purely gemstone based jewellery—join the collection of the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny, and sit beside the gardens that so profoundly shaped Monet’s art.” Last summer, Feng J travelled to the museum with a prototype of the piece in order to confront it with Monet’s original painting. Featuring hundreds of double rose cut gemstones and her signature floating setting, the jewel depicts an almost abstract dragonfly hovering above the tranquil Giverny pond, its outstretched wings echoing the drooping branches of the weeping willow in Monet’s composition.

Feng J – Painting with Gems since 2016

The Shanghai-based artist-jeweller Feng J established her jewellery Maison in Paris in 2016, with a resolute ambition to explore new forms of gem artistry and push the boundaries of High Jewellery. Her Impressionist- inspired designs swiftly captured the attention of leading figures in the field, who soon hailed her as a “prodigy” and an emerging force in contemporary jewellery.

Inspired by the work of Monet and Seurat, her work is also shaped by her affinity with traditional Chinese ink wash — her great-grandfather was a court painter, and she studied at the same art school as Zao Wou Ki. The artist is known for her “painterly” style, seeking to evoke the effect of an artist’s brushstrokes.
Just as Impressionist strokes move in different directions, she sets her stones at varying angles and on multiple levels, using them as pigments to build light and colour. Ten years since the creation of her Maison “Feng J – the Art of joialleirie,“ her Impressionist-inspired designs grace major museum collections, set records at auction and appear in showstopping exhibitions and art fairs around the world. Her sculptural pieces are held by the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Long Museum in Shanghai. They have also been featured at TEFAF Maastricht, Fine Arts Paris, the Opéra Garnier in Paris, and, more recently, at the grand exhibition “Journey with Minerals” by Van Cleef & Arpels’ L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts China.

MUSÉE DES IMPRESSIONNISMES GIVERNY

PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Before the Water Lilies. Monet discovers Giverny, 1883-1890 
from 27 March until 5 July 2026
Musée des impressionnismes Giverny
99 rue Claude Monet, 27620 Giverny, France
mdig.fr