Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Monet Venice Series

Quick specs Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Monet Venice Series
Price: on request
Size: 45.6 x 27.4 mm
Reference:
Q39334M4 (San Giorgio Maggiore)
Q39334M5 (The Grand Canal / Le Grand Canal / Canal Grande)
Q39334M6 (The Doge’s Palace / Le Palais Ducal / Palazzo Ducale) – limited to 10 pieces each

The Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Monet Venice Series pays tribute to the French painter Oscar-Claude Monet (14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926). In the autumn of 1908, almost in his 70s, he and his wife spend 10 weeks in the Italian “City of Water”. And during this period he paints 37 images.

Three of Monet’s Venice paintings are depicted in this new Venice Series, each limited to 10 pieces. And the launch of these models coincides with JLC’s participation in the Homo Faber Biennial exhibition in Venice in September 2024.

Art of Claude Monet in miniature

This Reverso Tribute combines JLC’s skills of miniature painting, enameling, and guillochage, and their passion for art. In 2023 this Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Hokusai was launched, with artwork of the Japanese artist Hokusai, and the new Venice models follow the same concept. The works of the Paris-born Claude Monet are the San Giorgio Maggiore, Le Grand Canal, and Le Palais Ducal.

The originals measure over 65 x 92 centimeters, all landscape, and they are repainted onto a surface of 25 x 20 millimeters in portrait mode. Which is impossible. So, the miniaturization is a partial display of the originals. Which doesn’t make them less impressive.

What is grand feu enamel?

The back of the case shows the works of Monet, created with grand feu enamel. This is a process where layers of paint, 14 here, are applied onto each other by heating them in an oven. Not at once, but after applying each layer, mostly a color, the object goes into the oven.

It is baked, cooled down, hardened, treated, checked on cracks (can happen), and then gets the next layer. It’s a delicate, ancient, time-consuming process by hand, but the results can be stunning.

The chosen works from Monet

Jaeger-LeCoultre has chosen Monet’s The San Giorgio Maggiore at Dusk, his painting of a 16th-century Benedictine church, for the first reference (Q39334M4). The dial on the front is also from grand feu enamel, in blue, with a herringbone guilloché pattern with 120 separate lines.

The reference Q39334M5 has Le Grand Canal depicted, the largest channel in Venice, and one of the main corridors. This one has a green dial on the front with a wave motif of 328 lines.

Palazzo Ducale

And lastly the reference Q39334M6 depicts Le Palais Ducal as Monet would call it but named Palazzo Ducale in Italian. It’s the palace of the former head of state of Venice (from centuries ago, the last abdicated in 1797), an elected lord called a Doge, or Ducale in Italian.

This model has a grand feu enamel dial on the front, in blue, with a lozenge pattern. Which has a translucent luminosity for which 4,905 guilloché lines were needed.

The Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Monet Venice Series has a power reserve of 42 hours

The movement of the Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Enamel Monet Venice Series is the Jaeger-LeCoultre caliber 822A/2. It’s a hand-wound mechanical caliber with a power reserve of 42 hours.

This Reverso comes on a black alligator leather strap, and each version is limited to 10 pieces. The price is on request but given the price of comparable models, we think it’s just above 100k.