French impressionist claude monet painted over 140 snowscapes as part of his fascination with capturing the changing light several of the impressionists painted snowscapes and as with their other landscapes they worked on these en plein airin the open air using natural light the magpie was created during the winter of 18681869 and is monets largest scale snowscape it is one of this first examples of monets use of coloured shadows it shows a magpie on a fence in a stone wall with a house