A Few Pigments
07-31-2005, 07:12 PM
This month we explore the pastels of Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1841-1919 http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/renoir_pierre-auguste.html
Auguste Renoir Gallery http://www.renoir.org.yu/
A Brief History of Impressionism
Centered in France, 1860's to 1880's
Impressionism is a light, spontaneous manner of painting which began in France as a reaction against the restrictions and conventions of the dominant Academic art http://www.artcyclopedia.com/history/academic-art.html . Its naturalistic and down-to-earth treatment of its subject matter, most commonly landscapes, has its roots in the French Realism http://www.artcyclopedia.com/history/realism.html of Camille Corot http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/corot_jean-baptiste-camille.html and others.
The movement's name was derived from Monet's early work, Impression: Sunrise, which was singled out for criticism by Louis Leroy upon its exhibition.
1873, Impression: Sunrise
oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=3123
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1873_Monet_Impression_Sunrise_oil.jpg
The hallmark of the style is the attempt to capture the subjective impression of light in a scene.
The core of the earliest Impressionist group was made up of;
1840-1926, Claude Monet, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/monet_claude.html
1839-1899, Alfred Sisley, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/sisley_alfred.html
1841-1919, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/renoir_pierre-auguste.html
Others associated with this period were:
1830-1903, Camille Pissarro, Caribbean-born French Pointillist/Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/pissarro_camille.html http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/pissarro_camille.html
1841-1870, Frédéric Bazille, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/bazille_frederic.html
1834-1917, Edgar Degas, French Realist/Impressionist Painter and Sculptor, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/degas_edgar.html
Masters of Pastels – December 2004 Edgar Germain Hilaire Degas
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=233729
1848-1894, Gustave Caillebotte, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/caillebotte_gustave.html
1832-1883, Edouard Manet, French Realist/Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/manet_edouard.html
Masters of Pastels-May 2005-Edouard Manet
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=268385
1841-1895, Berthe Morisot, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/morisot_berthe.html
Masters of Pastels-February 2005 Berthe Morisot http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=247377
1844-1926, Mary Cassatt, American Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/cassatt_mary.html
Masters of Pastels-January 2005 Mary Stevenson Cassatt http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=239801
The Impressionist style was probably the single most successful and identifiable "movement" ever, and is still widely practiced today. But as an intellectual school it faded towards the end of the 19th century, branching out into a variety of successive movements which are generally grouped under the term Post-Impressionism.
1841-1919, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist Painter
1876, Self Portrait at the Age of Thirty-Five, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4283
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1876_Renoir_Self_Portrait_at_the_Age_of_Thirty-Five_500.jpg
1910, Self Portrait, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6564
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1910_Renoir_Self_Portrait_500.jpg
1910, Self Portrait with a White Hat, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6566
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1910_Renoir_Self_Portrait_with_a_White_Hat_500.jpg
• Relationships: Father of film director Jean Renoir http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Renoir
Studied under Charles Gleyre, (1808-1874, Swiss Academic Painter) http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/gleyre_charles.html
Pierre-Auguste Renoir http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Auguste_Renoir
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Pierre-Auguste RenoirPierre-Auguste Renoir (February 25, 1841 – December 3, 1919) was a French artist who painted in the impressionist style.
The art of Renoir
Renoir's paintings show vibrant light and color, and harmony of lines. Unlike many impressionists who focused on landscapes, he painted not only landscapes, but people in intimate and candid compositions — sometimes applying paint with a palette knife rather than a brush. Characteristic of impressionism style, Renoir painted not the details of a scene, but instead his figures softly fuse with one another and the surroundings. In his late 1880s paintings the figures and scenery look more distinct from one another, but the paintings of his final years again display the softness.
His initial paintings show the influence of the artistry of Eugène Delacroix, and of his friend Claude Monet with whom he developed the impressionist style. The influence of Gustave Courbet, Édouard Manet and Camille Corot is also seen in his work.
In the late 1860s, obsessed with painting light and water, he and Monet discovered that the color of shadows is not brown or black, but the reflected color of the objects surrounding them.
One of the best known impressionist works is Renoir's 1876 Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette (Le Bal au Moulin de la Galette), which depicts an open-air scene, jammed with people, of a popular dance garden on the Butte Montmartre close to where he lived.
1876, Le Moulin de la Galette, Oil on canvas, 51 5/8 x 68 7/8 in. (131 x 175 cm), Musee d'Orsay, Paris
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1876_Renoir_Le_Moulin_de_la_Galette_500.jpg
A prolific painter, he made several thousand paintings.
The warm sensuality of Renoir's painting made his work some the best known and frequently reproduced work in the history of art.
Biography
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was born in Limoges, Haute-Vienne, France, the child of a working class family. As a boy, he worked in a porcelain factory where his drawing talent led to him painting designs on china. He worked painting hangings for overseas missionaries, and painting on fans before he enrolled in art school. During those years, he often visited the Louvre to study the French master painters.
In 1862 he began studying art under Charles Gleyre in Paris. There he met Alfred Sisley, Frederic Bazille and Claude Monet. At times during the 1860s, he did not have enough money to buy paints.
Although Renoir first exhibited paintings in 1864, recognition did not come for another 10 years due, in part, to the turmoil of the Franco-Prussian War.
During the Paris Commune in 1871, while he painted by the Seine River, a Commune group thought he was spying and they were about to throw him in the river when a Commune leader, Raoul Rigault, recognized Renoir as the man who protected him on an earlier occasion.
In the mid-1870s, he experienced his first acclaim his work hung in the first impressionist exhibition (1874).
While living and working in Montmartre, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montmartre Renoir engaged in an affair with his model, Suzanne Valadon, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/valadon_suzanne.html who became one of the leading female artists of the day. Later, he married Aline Victorine Charigot, and they had three sons, one of whom, Jean Renoir, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Renoir became a filmmaker. After marrying his work changed. He became as interested in painting people as he was in painting landscapes.
In 1881 he traveled to Algeria, a country he associated with Eugène Delacroix, then to Madrid, Spain to see the work of Diego Velázquez, also to Italy to see Titian's masterpieces in Florence, and the paintings of Raphael in Rome. On January 15, 1882 Renoir met composer Richard Wagner at his home in Palermo, Sicily. Renoir painted Wagner's portrait in just 35 minutes.
Renoir painted even during the last 20 years of his life when arthritis severely hampered his movement, and he was wheelchair-bound. In 1907, he moved to the warmer climate of "Les Collettes," a farm at Cagnes-sur-Mer, close to the Mediterranean coast. There, he painted by strapping a brush to his arm, and created sculptures by directing an assistant who worked the clay.
In 1919, Renoir visited the Louvre to see his paintings hanging with the old masters.
Pierre-Auguste Renoir died in the village of Cagnes-sur-Mer, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, on December 3, 1919.
Two of Renoir's paintings have sold for more than $70 million. Bal au moulin de la Galette, Montmartre sold for $78.1 million in 1990.
Biography Resource Center © 2001 Gale Group http://www.biography.com/impressionists/artists_renoir.html
Born February 25, 1841, in Limoges, France. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to Paris. Because he showed a remarkable talent for drawing, Renoir became an apprentice in a porcelain factory, where he painted plates. Later, after the factory had gone out of business, he worked for his older brother, decorating fans. Throughout these early years, Renoir made frequent visits to the Louvre, where he studied the art of earlier French masters, particularly those of the 18th century-Antoine Watteau, François Boucher, and Jean Honoré Fragonard. His deep respect for these artists informed his own painting throughout his career.
During the 1870s, a revolution erupted in French painting. Encouraged by artists like Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, a number of young painters began to seek alternatives to the traditions of Western painting that had prevailed since the beginning of the Renaissance. These artists went directly to nature for their inspiration and into the actual society of which they were a part. As a result, their works revealed a look of freshness and immediacy that in many ways departed from the look of Old Master painting. The new art, for instance, displayed vibrant light and color instead of the somber browns and blacks that had dominated previous painting. These qualities, among others, signaled the beginning of modern art.
Early Career
In 1862, Renoir decided to study painting seriously and entered the Atelier Gleyre, where he met Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley, and Jean Frédéric Bazille. During the next six years, Renoir's art showed the influence of Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, the two most innovative painters of the 1850s and 1860s. Courbet's influence is especially evident in the bold palette-knife technique of Diane Chasseresse (1867), while Manet's can be seen in the flat tones of Alfred Sisley and His Wife (1868). Still, both paintings reveal a sense of intimacy that is characteristic of Renoir's personal style.
The 1860s were difficult years for Renoir. At times he was too poor to buy paints or canvas, and the Salons of 1866 and 1867 rejected his works. The following year the Salon accepted his painting Lise. He continued to develop his work and to study the paintings of his contemporaries-not only Courbet and Manet, but Camille Corot and Eugène Delacroix as well. Renoir's indebtedness to Delacroix is apparent in the lush painterliness of the Odalisque (1870).
Renoir and Impressionism
In 1869, Renoir and Monet worked together at La Grenouillère, a bathing spot on the Seine. Both artists became obsessed with painting light and water. According to Phoebe Pool (1967), http://cgi.ebay.com/Impressionism-Phoebe-Pool-The-World-of-Art-1979-SC_W0QQitemZ4535068441QQcategoryZ378QQssPageNameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
this was a decisive moment in the development of Impressionism, for "It was there that Renoir and Monet made their discovery that shadows are not brown or black but are coloured by their surroundings, and that the 'local colour' of an object is modified by the light in which it is seen, by reflections from other objects and by contrast with juxtaposed colours."
The styles of Renoir and Monet were virtually identical at this time, an indication of the dedication with which they pursued and shared their new discoveries. During the 1870s, they still occasionally worked together, although their styles generally developed in more personal directions.
In 1874, Renoir participated in the first Impressionist exhibition, along with Monet, Edgar Degas, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, and Berthe Morisot. His works included The Opera Box (1874),
1874, Renoir, The Theater Box, (La loge), oil on canvas, 31 1-2 x 25 inches. http://sunsite.icm.edu.pl/wm/paint/auth/renoir/loge/
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1874_Renoir_The_Theater_Box_La_loge_500.jpg
a painting which shows the artist's penchant for rich and freely handled figurative expression. Of all the Impressionists, Renoir most consistently and thoroughly adapted the new style-in its inspiration, essentially a landscape style-to the great tradition of figure painting.
Although the Impressionist exhibitions were the targets of much public ridicule during the 1870s, Renoir's patronage gradually increased during the decade. He became a friend of Caillebotte, one of the first patrons of the Impressionists, and he was also backed by the art dealer Durand-Ruel and by collectors like Victor Choquet, the Charpentiers, and the Daidets. The artist's connection with these individuals is documented by a number of handsome portraits, for instance, Madame Charpentier and Her Children (1878).
In the 1870s, Renoir also produced some of his most celebrated Impressionist genre scenes, including The Swing and The Ball at the Moulin de la Galette (both 1876). These works embody his most basic attitudes about art and life. They show men and women together, openly and casually enjoying a society diffused with warm, radiant sunlight. Figures blend softly into one another and into their surrounding space. Such worlds are pleasurable, sensuous, and generously endowed with human feeling.
Renoir's "Dry" Period
During the 1880s, Renoir gradually separated himself from the other Impressionists, largely because he became dissatisfied with the direction the new style was taking in his own hands. In paintings like The Luncheon of the Boating Party (1881), he felt that his style was becoming too loose, that forms were losing their distinctiveness and sense of mass. As a result, he looked to the past for a fresh inspiration. In 1881, he traveled to Italy and was particularly impressed by the art of Raphael.
During the next six years, Renoir's paintings became increasingly dry: he began to draw in a tight, classical manner, carefully outlining his figures in an effort to give them plastic clarity. The works from this period, such as The Umbrellas (1883) and Les grandes baigneuses (1884-1887), are generally considered the least successful of Renoir's mature expressions. Their classicizing effort seems self-conscious, a contradiction to the warm sensuality that came naturally to him.
Late Career
By the end of the 1880s, Renoir had passed through his dry period. His late work is truly extraordinary: a glorious outpouring of monumental nude figures, beautiful young girls, and lush landscapes. Examples of this style include The Music Lesson (1891), Young Girl Reading (1892), and Sleeping Bather (1897). In many ways, the generosity of feeling in these paintings expands upon the achievements of his great work in the 1870s.
Renoir's health declined severely in his later years. In 1903, he suffered his first attack of rheumatoid arthritis and settled for the winter at Cagnes-sur-Mer. By this time he faced no financial problems, but the arthritis made painting painful and often impossible. Nevertheless, he continued to work, at times with a brush tied to his crippled hand. Renoir died at Cagnes-sur-Mer on December 3, 1919, but his death was preceded by an experience of supreme triumph: the state had purchased his portrait Madame Georges Charpentier (1877), and he traveled to Paris in August to see it hanging in the Louvre.
Renoir, Clips from a movie about Renior http://www.roland-collection.com/rolandcollection/section/19/411.htm
Renoir's greatest fame came from his association with the French Impressionist painters of the later nineteenth century. The Impressionists captured their immediate surroundings in richly colored, fluently sketched canvases often executed out of doors rather than in the studio. But Renoir's long career encompassed a wide range of styles and there is a world of difference between the ambitious subject pictures he painted in the 1860s and the glowing nudes that he produced in the final years before his death in 1919. This video explores the full range of Renoir's extraordinary talent through detailed photography and an illuminating script by John House, one of the selectors of the Renoir exhibition seen in London, Paris and Boston.
© 1998-2001 The Roland Collection & Pira Intl.
Undated Pastels:
Bather Seated by the Sea, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6950
Bust of a Woman, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6957
Study of a Woman, Pastel on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=7108
Young Girl in a Blue Corset, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=7167
Dated Pastels:
1875, At the Moulin de la Galette, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4257
1875, Portrait of Lucien Daudet , pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4231
1877, Portrait of a Woman. (Portrait de femme). c. 1877. Pastel on paper mounted on cardboard http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir207.html
1877, Portrait of a Young Woman aka Ellen Andree, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4332
1877, Young Woman in a Straw Hat, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4333
1878-1880, Head of a Young Woman, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4363
1879, Ellen Andre, pastels, 58.5 x 42.5 cm, 23.03 x 16.73 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=10410
1879, Portrait of a Child, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4410
1879, Portrait of a Young Girl aka Elizabeth Maitre, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4365
1879, Seated Woman, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4375
1879, Spring (The Four Seasons), pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4366
1879, Two Women with Umbrellas, Pastel on paper http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir110.html
1879, The Loge, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4377
1879-1880, Portrait of a Girl, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4418
1880, Portrait in a Pink Dress, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4439
1880, Portrait of a Little Girl, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4435
1880-1881, Boating Couple aka Aline Charigot and Renoir, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4446
1881, Portrait of a Woman in a Red Dress, Pastel, pen and black ink and pencil on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4482
1882-1883, Woman with a Blue Blouse ,pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4510
1883, Seated Bather, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4534
1885, Nude Arranging Her Hair, pastel on paper, 60.64 x 47.31 cm, 23.88 x 18.63 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=17733
1885-1890, Nude in an Armchair, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4569
1885-1890, Young Blond Girl, Pastel and pencil on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4568
1887, Paul Charpentier, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4597
1887, Portrait of a Young Girl, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4594
1887, Portrait of Madeleine Adam, Pastel and pencil on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4592
1888, Head of a Child aka Edmond, Pastel on buff paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4613
1889-1890, Portrait of Pierre, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4642
1890, A Girl, pastel http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir121.html
1894, Bathers, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5908
1895, Portrait of Jean Renoir, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5936
1895, Two Women in a Garden, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5930
1895, Young Girl Slipping on Her Stockings, pastel, 32 x 37 cm., 12.6 x 14.57 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=10411
1901, Sara Looking to the Right, Pastel and charcoal on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6328
1902, Jean and Coco (the artist's sons), Pastel on paper, laid down on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6333
1904, Coco Holding a Orange, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6349
Auguste Renoir Gallery http://www.renoir.org.yu/
A Brief History of Impressionism
Centered in France, 1860's to 1880's
Impressionism is a light, spontaneous manner of painting which began in France as a reaction against the restrictions and conventions of the dominant Academic art http://www.artcyclopedia.com/history/academic-art.html . Its naturalistic and down-to-earth treatment of its subject matter, most commonly landscapes, has its roots in the French Realism http://www.artcyclopedia.com/history/realism.html of Camille Corot http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/corot_jean-baptiste-camille.html and others.
The movement's name was derived from Monet's early work, Impression: Sunrise, which was singled out for criticism by Louis Leroy upon its exhibition.
1873, Impression: Sunrise
oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=3123
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1873_Monet_Impression_Sunrise_oil.jpg
The hallmark of the style is the attempt to capture the subjective impression of light in a scene.
The core of the earliest Impressionist group was made up of;
1840-1926, Claude Monet, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/monet_claude.html
1839-1899, Alfred Sisley, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/sisley_alfred.html
1841-1919, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/renoir_pierre-auguste.html
Others associated with this period were:
1830-1903, Camille Pissarro, Caribbean-born French Pointillist/Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/pissarro_camille.html http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/pissarro_camille.html
1841-1870, Frédéric Bazille, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/bazille_frederic.html
1834-1917, Edgar Degas, French Realist/Impressionist Painter and Sculptor, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/degas_edgar.html
Masters of Pastels – December 2004 Edgar Germain Hilaire Degas
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=233729
1848-1894, Gustave Caillebotte, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/caillebotte_gustave.html
1832-1883, Edouard Manet, French Realist/Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/manet_edouard.html
Masters of Pastels-May 2005-Edouard Manet
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=268385
1841-1895, Berthe Morisot, French Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/morisot_berthe.html
Masters of Pastels-February 2005 Berthe Morisot http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=247377
1844-1926, Mary Cassatt, American Impressionist Painter, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/cassatt_mary.html
Masters of Pastels-January 2005 Mary Stevenson Cassatt http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=239801
The Impressionist style was probably the single most successful and identifiable "movement" ever, and is still widely practiced today. But as an intellectual school it faded towards the end of the 19th century, branching out into a variety of successive movements which are generally grouped under the term Post-Impressionism.
1841-1919, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist Painter
1876, Self Portrait at the Age of Thirty-Five, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4283
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1876_Renoir_Self_Portrait_at_the_Age_of_Thirty-Five_500.jpg
1910, Self Portrait, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6564
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1910_Renoir_Self_Portrait_500.jpg
1910, Self Portrait with a White Hat, oil on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6566
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1910_Renoir_Self_Portrait_with_a_White_Hat_500.jpg
• Relationships: Father of film director Jean Renoir http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Renoir
Studied under Charles Gleyre, (1808-1874, Swiss Academic Painter) http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/gleyre_charles.html
Pierre-Auguste Renoir http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Auguste_Renoir
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Pierre-Auguste RenoirPierre-Auguste Renoir (February 25, 1841 – December 3, 1919) was a French artist who painted in the impressionist style.
The art of Renoir
Renoir's paintings show vibrant light and color, and harmony of lines. Unlike many impressionists who focused on landscapes, he painted not only landscapes, but people in intimate and candid compositions — sometimes applying paint with a palette knife rather than a brush. Characteristic of impressionism style, Renoir painted not the details of a scene, but instead his figures softly fuse with one another and the surroundings. In his late 1880s paintings the figures and scenery look more distinct from one another, but the paintings of his final years again display the softness.
His initial paintings show the influence of the artistry of Eugène Delacroix, and of his friend Claude Monet with whom he developed the impressionist style. The influence of Gustave Courbet, Édouard Manet and Camille Corot is also seen in his work.
In the late 1860s, obsessed with painting light and water, he and Monet discovered that the color of shadows is not brown or black, but the reflected color of the objects surrounding them.
One of the best known impressionist works is Renoir's 1876 Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette (Le Bal au Moulin de la Galette), which depicts an open-air scene, jammed with people, of a popular dance garden on the Butte Montmartre close to where he lived.
1876, Le Moulin de la Galette, Oil on canvas, 51 5/8 x 68 7/8 in. (131 x 175 cm), Musee d'Orsay, Paris
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1876_Renoir_Le_Moulin_de_la_Galette_500.jpg
A prolific painter, he made several thousand paintings.
The warm sensuality of Renoir's painting made his work some the best known and frequently reproduced work in the history of art.
Biography
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was born in Limoges, Haute-Vienne, France, the child of a working class family. As a boy, he worked in a porcelain factory where his drawing talent led to him painting designs on china. He worked painting hangings for overseas missionaries, and painting on fans before he enrolled in art school. During those years, he often visited the Louvre to study the French master painters.
In 1862 he began studying art under Charles Gleyre in Paris. There he met Alfred Sisley, Frederic Bazille and Claude Monet. At times during the 1860s, he did not have enough money to buy paints.
Although Renoir first exhibited paintings in 1864, recognition did not come for another 10 years due, in part, to the turmoil of the Franco-Prussian War.
During the Paris Commune in 1871, while he painted by the Seine River, a Commune group thought he was spying and they were about to throw him in the river when a Commune leader, Raoul Rigault, recognized Renoir as the man who protected him on an earlier occasion.
In the mid-1870s, he experienced his first acclaim his work hung in the first impressionist exhibition (1874).
While living and working in Montmartre, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montmartre Renoir engaged in an affair with his model, Suzanne Valadon, http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/valadon_suzanne.html who became one of the leading female artists of the day. Later, he married Aline Victorine Charigot, and they had three sons, one of whom, Jean Renoir, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Renoir became a filmmaker. After marrying his work changed. He became as interested in painting people as he was in painting landscapes.
In 1881 he traveled to Algeria, a country he associated with Eugène Delacroix, then to Madrid, Spain to see the work of Diego Velázquez, also to Italy to see Titian's masterpieces in Florence, and the paintings of Raphael in Rome. On January 15, 1882 Renoir met composer Richard Wagner at his home in Palermo, Sicily. Renoir painted Wagner's portrait in just 35 minutes.
Renoir painted even during the last 20 years of his life when arthritis severely hampered his movement, and he was wheelchair-bound. In 1907, he moved to the warmer climate of "Les Collettes," a farm at Cagnes-sur-Mer, close to the Mediterranean coast. There, he painted by strapping a brush to his arm, and created sculptures by directing an assistant who worked the clay.
In 1919, Renoir visited the Louvre to see his paintings hanging with the old masters.
Pierre-Auguste Renoir died in the village of Cagnes-sur-Mer, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, on December 3, 1919.
Two of Renoir's paintings have sold for more than $70 million. Bal au moulin de la Galette, Montmartre sold for $78.1 million in 1990.
Biography Resource Center © 2001 Gale Group http://www.biography.com/impressionists/artists_renoir.html
Born February 25, 1841, in Limoges, France. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to Paris. Because he showed a remarkable talent for drawing, Renoir became an apprentice in a porcelain factory, where he painted plates. Later, after the factory had gone out of business, he worked for his older brother, decorating fans. Throughout these early years, Renoir made frequent visits to the Louvre, where he studied the art of earlier French masters, particularly those of the 18th century-Antoine Watteau, François Boucher, and Jean Honoré Fragonard. His deep respect for these artists informed his own painting throughout his career.
During the 1870s, a revolution erupted in French painting. Encouraged by artists like Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, a number of young painters began to seek alternatives to the traditions of Western painting that had prevailed since the beginning of the Renaissance. These artists went directly to nature for their inspiration and into the actual society of which they were a part. As a result, their works revealed a look of freshness and immediacy that in many ways departed from the look of Old Master painting. The new art, for instance, displayed vibrant light and color instead of the somber browns and blacks that had dominated previous painting. These qualities, among others, signaled the beginning of modern art.
Early Career
In 1862, Renoir decided to study painting seriously and entered the Atelier Gleyre, where he met Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley, and Jean Frédéric Bazille. During the next six years, Renoir's art showed the influence of Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, the two most innovative painters of the 1850s and 1860s. Courbet's influence is especially evident in the bold palette-knife technique of Diane Chasseresse (1867), while Manet's can be seen in the flat tones of Alfred Sisley and His Wife (1868). Still, both paintings reveal a sense of intimacy that is characteristic of Renoir's personal style.
The 1860s were difficult years for Renoir. At times he was too poor to buy paints or canvas, and the Salons of 1866 and 1867 rejected his works. The following year the Salon accepted his painting Lise. He continued to develop his work and to study the paintings of his contemporaries-not only Courbet and Manet, but Camille Corot and Eugène Delacroix as well. Renoir's indebtedness to Delacroix is apparent in the lush painterliness of the Odalisque (1870).
Renoir and Impressionism
In 1869, Renoir and Monet worked together at La Grenouillère, a bathing spot on the Seine. Both artists became obsessed with painting light and water. According to Phoebe Pool (1967), http://cgi.ebay.com/Impressionism-Phoebe-Pool-The-World-of-Art-1979-SC_W0QQitemZ4535068441QQcategoryZ378QQssPageNameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
this was a decisive moment in the development of Impressionism, for "It was there that Renoir and Monet made their discovery that shadows are not brown or black but are coloured by their surroundings, and that the 'local colour' of an object is modified by the light in which it is seen, by reflections from other objects and by contrast with juxtaposed colours."
The styles of Renoir and Monet were virtually identical at this time, an indication of the dedication with which they pursued and shared their new discoveries. During the 1870s, they still occasionally worked together, although their styles generally developed in more personal directions.
In 1874, Renoir participated in the first Impressionist exhibition, along with Monet, Edgar Degas, Alfred Sisley, Camille Pissarro, and Berthe Morisot. His works included The Opera Box (1874),
1874, Renoir, The Theater Box, (La loge), oil on canvas, 31 1-2 x 25 inches. http://sunsite.icm.edu.pl/wm/paint/auth/renoir/loge/
http://www.wetcanvas.com/Community/images/31-Jul-2005/42249-1874_Renoir_The_Theater_Box_La_loge_500.jpg
a painting which shows the artist's penchant for rich and freely handled figurative expression. Of all the Impressionists, Renoir most consistently and thoroughly adapted the new style-in its inspiration, essentially a landscape style-to the great tradition of figure painting.
Although the Impressionist exhibitions were the targets of much public ridicule during the 1870s, Renoir's patronage gradually increased during the decade. He became a friend of Caillebotte, one of the first patrons of the Impressionists, and he was also backed by the art dealer Durand-Ruel and by collectors like Victor Choquet, the Charpentiers, and the Daidets. The artist's connection with these individuals is documented by a number of handsome portraits, for instance, Madame Charpentier and Her Children (1878).
In the 1870s, Renoir also produced some of his most celebrated Impressionist genre scenes, including The Swing and The Ball at the Moulin de la Galette (both 1876). These works embody his most basic attitudes about art and life. They show men and women together, openly and casually enjoying a society diffused with warm, radiant sunlight. Figures blend softly into one another and into their surrounding space. Such worlds are pleasurable, sensuous, and generously endowed with human feeling.
Renoir's "Dry" Period
During the 1880s, Renoir gradually separated himself from the other Impressionists, largely because he became dissatisfied with the direction the new style was taking in his own hands. In paintings like The Luncheon of the Boating Party (1881), he felt that his style was becoming too loose, that forms were losing their distinctiveness and sense of mass. As a result, he looked to the past for a fresh inspiration. In 1881, he traveled to Italy and was particularly impressed by the art of Raphael.
During the next six years, Renoir's paintings became increasingly dry: he began to draw in a tight, classical manner, carefully outlining his figures in an effort to give them plastic clarity. The works from this period, such as The Umbrellas (1883) and Les grandes baigneuses (1884-1887), are generally considered the least successful of Renoir's mature expressions. Their classicizing effort seems self-conscious, a contradiction to the warm sensuality that came naturally to him.
Late Career
By the end of the 1880s, Renoir had passed through his dry period. His late work is truly extraordinary: a glorious outpouring of monumental nude figures, beautiful young girls, and lush landscapes. Examples of this style include The Music Lesson (1891), Young Girl Reading (1892), and Sleeping Bather (1897). In many ways, the generosity of feeling in these paintings expands upon the achievements of his great work in the 1870s.
Renoir's health declined severely in his later years. In 1903, he suffered his first attack of rheumatoid arthritis and settled for the winter at Cagnes-sur-Mer. By this time he faced no financial problems, but the arthritis made painting painful and often impossible. Nevertheless, he continued to work, at times with a brush tied to his crippled hand. Renoir died at Cagnes-sur-Mer on December 3, 1919, but his death was preceded by an experience of supreme triumph: the state had purchased his portrait Madame Georges Charpentier (1877), and he traveled to Paris in August to see it hanging in the Louvre.
Renoir, Clips from a movie about Renior http://www.roland-collection.com/rolandcollection/section/19/411.htm
Renoir's greatest fame came from his association with the French Impressionist painters of the later nineteenth century. The Impressionists captured their immediate surroundings in richly colored, fluently sketched canvases often executed out of doors rather than in the studio. But Renoir's long career encompassed a wide range of styles and there is a world of difference between the ambitious subject pictures he painted in the 1860s and the glowing nudes that he produced in the final years before his death in 1919. This video explores the full range of Renoir's extraordinary talent through detailed photography and an illuminating script by John House, one of the selectors of the Renoir exhibition seen in London, Paris and Boston.
© 1998-2001 The Roland Collection & Pira Intl.
Undated Pastels:
Bather Seated by the Sea, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6950
Bust of a Woman, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6957
Study of a Woman, Pastel on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=7108
Young Girl in a Blue Corset, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=7167
Dated Pastels:
1875, At the Moulin de la Galette, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4257
1875, Portrait of Lucien Daudet , pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4231
1877, Portrait of a Woman. (Portrait de femme). c. 1877. Pastel on paper mounted on cardboard http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir207.html
1877, Portrait of a Young Woman aka Ellen Andree, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4332
1877, Young Woman in a Straw Hat, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4333
1878-1880, Head of a Young Woman, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4363
1879, Ellen Andre, pastels, 58.5 x 42.5 cm, 23.03 x 16.73 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=10410
1879, Portrait of a Child, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4410
1879, Portrait of a Young Girl aka Elizabeth Maitre, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4365
1879, Seated Woman, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4375
1879, Spring (The Four Seasons), pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4366
1879, Two Women with Umbrellas, Pastel on paper http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir110.html
1879, The Loge, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4377
1879-1880, Portrait of a Girl, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4418
1880, Portrait in a Pink Dress, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4439
1880, Portrait of a Little Girl, Pastel on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4435
1880-1881, Boating Couple aka Aline Charigot and Renoir, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4446
1881, Portrait of a Woman in a Red Dress, Pastel, pen and black ink and pencil on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4482
1882-1883, Woman with a Blue Blouse ,pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4510
1883, Seated Bather, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4534
1885, Nude Arranging Her Hair, pastel on paper, 60.64 x 47.31 cm, 23.88 x 18.63 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=17733
1885-1890, Nude in an Armchair, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4569
1885-1890, Young Blond Girl, Pastel and pencil on paper, laid down on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4568
1887, Paul Charpentier, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4597
1887, Portrait of a Young Girl, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4594
1887, Portrait of Madeleine Adam, Pastel and pencil on paper, mounted on board http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4592
1888, Head of a Child aka Edmond, Pastel on buff paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4613
1889-1890, Portrait of Pierre, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=4642
1890, A Girl, pastel http://www.abcgallery.com/R/renoir/renoir121.html
1894, Bathers, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5908
1895, Portrait of Jean Renoir, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5936
1895, Two Women in a Garden, pastel http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=5930
1895, Young Girl Slipping on Her Stockings, pastel, 32 x 37 cm., 12.6 x 14.57 in. http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=10411
1901, Sara Looking to the Right, Pastel and charcoal on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6328
1902, Jean and Coco (the artist's sons), Pastel on paper, laid down on canvas http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6333
1904, Coco Holding a Orange, Pastel on paper http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=6349