X-Rays May Have Found a Hidden Monet Self-Portrait in The Luncheon

Scientific analysis of Claude Monet's The Luncheon (1873) has uncovered a hidden bearded man in profile that may be a self-portrait — a potential first for an artist who almost never depicted himself.

Conservation scientists at the Center for Research and Restoration of the Museums of France (C2RMF) carried out the technical examination ahead of the painting's current display at the Musée d'Orsay and a planned restoration beginning in late 2027. The Orsay is showing the work in "I Spend My Life Painting," one of two exhibitions — alongside the Musée de l'Orangerie's "Claude Monet, Painting Time" — marking the 100th anniversary of Monet's death in 1926.

"Monet scarcely ever painted himself, so if this is indeed a self-representation, it would be a major discovery," Anne Robbins, curator of paintings at the Musée d'Orsay, told ARTnews.

The findings come from X-ray analysis and transmitted infrared photography, a technique that lights the canvas from behind. Beneath the familiar surface of The Luncheon, the team documented extensive changes to the large canvas, which measures 5 feet 3 inches by 6 feet 7 inches.

"The table itself was altered. As for the trolley in front of it, with some bread and a wine glass, it was shifted to the right; and the fruit plate moved accordingly," said Johanna Salvant, a conservation scientist and PhD researcher at C2RMF who was part of the analysis team.

The painting, part of a series of garden scenes Monet made while renting a house in Argenteuil, about 7.5 miles northwest of Paris, shows the aftermath of a meal. Monet's young son Jean appears at the left; his first wife Camille walks in the background with a friend or neighbor. Infrared examination confirmed that two women once sat on the bench where a basket and a folded parasol now rest.

"A detail now appearing as a rose was originally rounded and may have been conceived as a piece of fruit," Salvant said. "In an earlier state, Jean had his back almost turned to the viewer, whereas in the final composition he is shown in three-quarter view, facing us more directly."

The analysis also revealed a figure looming in a window and, at the composition's left edge, a bearded man wearing a hat, standing in profile. Gilles Bastian, heritage curator at C2RMF, said Monet "subsequently expanded the flower beds, covering the figure almost entirely. The extension of the foliage seems to have been handled in a looser, somewhat more conventional manner."

The self-portrait identification rests on comparison with Renoir's Monet Painting in His Garden at Argenteuil (1873), now at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Connecticut, which shows Monet in a soft hat — though facing the opposite direction. Robbins cautioned that the identification remains a hypothesis and that research is ongoing: "We will need time to get to the bottom of these discoveries."

Why did Monet paint the figures out? One explanation lies in how he presented the canvas at the Second Impressionist Exhibition in 1876, under the title Decorative Panel. He was in financial difficulty and seeking patrons. "Covering the figures may have contributed to making the painting more neutral and adaptable as a decorative object," Robbins said.

The strategy may have worked. Ernest Hoschedé — the first owner of Impression, Sunrise (1872), the painting that gave the movement its name — may have seen The Luncheon at the 1876 exhibition, an encounter that may have led to his commission for a four-panel decorative cycle for his château at Montgeron.

The discoveries also recalibrate the image of Monet as a purely spontaneous plein-air painter. The Luncheon reveals an elaborate, experimental process: Monet repositioned figures, modified objects and radically altered the composition's balance through successive interventions.

Two other works in the Orsay exhibition underwent similar C2RMF analysis. The Magpie (1868–69) originally depicted a row of three houses before Monet replaced one with the bird at its center. Women in the Garden (1866) shows Monet had stitched the canvas back together after an accident — a work he reportedly finished by digging a trench in the garden so he could lower himself to reach the top of the canvas. The exhibition also includes the two other recently analyzed works, The Thaw at Vétheuil (ca. 1880s) and Cathedral (1892–93), tracing each decade of the artist's career.

"While the Musée Marmottan Monet holds the largest collection of Monet's works in numbers," said Orsay chief curator Sylvie Patry, "the Musée d'Orsay houses the most comprehensive ensemble, in the sense that it covers the different stages of his career and his changes in technique."

The restoration planned for late 2027 will give scientists another chance to examine The Luncheon's material history — and, perhaps, to confirm whether Monet hid himself in his own garden.