Water impression2.

In his first water-lily series (1897–99), Monet painted the pond environment, with its plants, bridge, and trees neatly divided by a fixed horizon.

Rather than mixing reds and blues to create purple hues, Monet preferred the brilliant color of cobalt violet. In Water Lilies, touches of cobalt violet are evident throughout the water, where he painted the shadowed areas of the pond's surface with more purplish blue tones.

Impressionism can be defined as having three main elements that distinguish it from other types of art. These are its depiction of light, its brush strokes, and its open composition. Secondary to this are its focus on movement or subject matter of the everyday. 

Light plays as large a part as the subject matter in Impressionist paintings. The thick application of paint to emphasize light meant that it stands on a platform as a defining feature of most pieces.

Light dancing upon water can be as important as the objects being reflected upon it.

Brushstrokes were generally short, globule-like splodges of paint. Placed on top of one another, these heavy, strokes gave movement, in place of detail and finesse. Hard edges were avoided by working wet paint into more wet paint, blurring lines and boundaries.

Finally, the affinity for open compositions was another defining factor. No longer did the painting focus solely on the subject, with the matter ending at its border.

Impressionism ran the pictures and their shapes off the edge of the canvas, to give the illusion that a world existed outside the realms of the frame.