About Water Lilies
Claude Monet painted Water Lilies in 1906 in his garden at Giverny, in Normandy, where he had dug a pond and filled it with water lilies. For the last three decades of his life the pond was his main subject, and he painted it some 250 times, in every season and every light.
In this version there is no shore, no horizon and no sky, only the surface of the water seen from above. Clusters of lily pads and pink and white flowers float on it, while the blue of the sky and the dark green of the trees on the bank appear only as reflections. The picture is close to square, as if it were a window cut into the pond.
The painting belongs to the Art Institute of Chicago. Monet’s late water lily paintings, which grew larger and looser over the years, are often seen as a step toward abstract painting.
Tips for this puzzle
There are no straight lines and no edges to the scene itself, so the border is the place to begin. Then follow the clusters of lily pads, which run across the picture in loose diagonal bands.
Claude Monet, Water Lilies, 1906. The Art Institute of Chicago. Public domain (CC0); image: www.artic.edu. Image source. All image credits
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How to play
- Pick 12 to 150 pieces (up to 48 on a phone). Each piece count keeps its own puzzle, so you can switch and come back.
- Drag a piece into the frame. Drop it close to where it belongs and it clicks into place and stays there.
- Outside the frame, drop a piece next to one it fits and they join. A joined group moves as one, and clicks into the frame as one.
- Preview shows the whole painting faintly in the frame. Edges only hides every piece without a straight edge, so you can do the border first.
- Tidy lines up the loose pieces beside the frame, edge pieces first. Press it again to scatter them.
- The clock starts with your first move and stops while you’re paused or in another tab. There’s no time limit.
- Your puzzle is saved in this browser as you go. Leave and come back to carry on where you left off.
Keyboard
Press Tab to go from piece to piece. The arrow keys move the piece one place at a time, lined up with the places in the frame, and Enter or Space drops it.
A jigsaw is a puzzle about seeing shapes and colors, so there’s no way to play it with a screen reader. We’re sorry about that.
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