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Monet garden attracts thousands of visitors

One of the most exciting horticultural projects taking place in New York City at the moment has to be the Claude Monet Garden.

Housed at the New York Botanical Garden, the display which is inspired by the impressionists vibrant paintings, the changing, seasonal display will be on show until October 2012.

It has already attracted hundreds of thousands of gardening enthusiasts and many more are expected to visit in the intervening months.

It may even encourage green-fingered gardeners to grab their gardening tools and and create displays based on other sources of impressionist art.

Paul Tucker, curator of the temporary garden, said: "The gardens were a constant in [Monet's] life.

"He tended to them lovingly and with plenty of money and with hired hands. He was fabulously rich at the turn of the century."

The replica gardens look astonishing and would have no doubt impressed Monet – who once suggested that flowers may have been the reason he became an artist in the first place.

As well as the incredible botanical attractions, which closely mirror some of the painter's most famous works, the special exhibition also includes two paintings, one of which has never been publicly exhibited in the United States.

There will also be an array of other Monet artefacts on display, including his mixing palette, receipts for his beloved plants, letters, photographs and much more.

There is even a Monet Garden app available for download, which allows people to create their own impressionist images using their smartphone's camera. It is part of the NYBG in Bloom iPhone app.

Monet's original inspirational garden was planted at a house in Giverny, in Normandy, some 50 miles north-west of Paris. He spent most of his later life painting from this idyll, although he dedicated much of his time to gardening.

He created an exotic water garden during this period, planting water lilies that were to feature in many of his later works.