Pierre Auguste Renoir
Pierre Auguste RenoirPierre Auguste Renoir
Background Information
Pierre Auguste Renoir was born on February 25, 1841, in Limoges, France. In 1845, his father, a tailor by trade, moved his family to Paris in hopes of finding his fortunes in the capital. They moved into a small apartment building which has been part of a sixteenth century housing complex for the Palace Guard. He developed, throughout his childhood, an intense love of the city and its people (www.augusterenoir.com).
Renoir was not an exceptional student. Perhaps this was due to his generally shy and quiet personality. He had a terrible fear of drawing any attention to himself and retained this dislike throughout his career. Although Renoir had three brothers, he always felt much closer to his mother and Lisa, his sister.
As a child, Renoir was constantly doodling in his schoolbooks or drawing on the floors at home. He would quickly sketch anything in sight. During this same time, young Renoir joined the choir at the church of St. Eustache. At the age of thirteen, Renoir began work as an apprentice in the porcelain craft shop of Levy Freres et Compagnie (www.augusterenoir.com). At age of sixteen, Renoir unveiled his first oil painting. This critical moment met with praise from his city and his parents. However, it would be some time before Renoir would consider himself an artist. He continued to paint porcelain until automation rendered hand decoration obsolete.
Since his fans required different subject matters and themes than the porcelain, Renoir renewed his visits to Louvre in search of workable ideas. He discovered the sensuous, sometimes frivolous, works of Fragonard, Boucher, and Watteau. His taste in art was being formed. As he later started about Boucher's, "Diane au bain": "it was the first picture to thrill me, and I've continued to love it all my life as one does love one's first loves" (Tyler, 37).
In 1862, he had saved sufficient money to enable him to study full-time. "he enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux Arts and at the same time, entered the studio of Charles Gleyre" (De Grada, 81). Here, Renoir met three painters were Claude Monet, Federic Bazille, and Alfred Sisley.
Artist's Major Works
Renoir painted many classic and major paintings. Many of which are located at museums around the world. One of Renoir's major works includes, "The Umberllas." "The Umbrellas," is located at the National Gallery in London. "The Umbrellas" has become for English audiences one of the most familiar and best loved of all Renoir's works. "The Umbrellas is also one of Renoir's most modern paintings in structural terms, and reveals a great deal about his changing styles between the beginning and middle of the 1880's" (Cogniat, 136).
Renoir used his future wife, Aline, for the model. The colors of this picture are full and varied. Each person in the painting has a smile on his or her face. The painting was started in 1881 and was not finished until four years later. Renoir used both young and middle aged people and brought them together in perfect harmony as told by their faces. The woman with the basket has quite a different cut in her dress than the others. One can see sharp contrasts in painting style, but one must also appreciate its complex construction.
Another painting of Renoir's major works is "The Bathers." This painting is Renoir's most ambitious work of the 1880's and the one by which he set greatest store. An important influence on "The Bathers" was the classical treatment of the nudes. As one can see, the women in the painting are nude. Renoir had been determined in this painting to produce a major work glorifying the female nude in a manner that could only rank with the Old Masters. "The linear, classical emphasis of the nudes contrast with the loser handling of the rest of the painting, but this may be an example of the sort of irregularity that Renoir was trying to achieve." The contrast between the background and the women, make the women stand out. This painting can be found at the Philadelphia Museum of art.
Works Examined
Of course, I examined two of Renoir's major works, but I also examined two other paintings of Renoir. One of the works I examined is known as "The Swing." The focal point of this painting is the women in white, swinging lightly on a summer afternoon, and the eye is drawn to her not only by the use of color, but also by the deliberate contrast of brushwork. The freshness of the work is to some extent the result of the absence of any strong lines. Theodore Duret once said that the woman in this painting "shows the relaxed abandon appropriate to young women who have eaten and are enjoying themselves in the company of young men, but above all she shows a niceness and mischievous charm which only he could impart to the feminine world" (Pritzker, 54). The off-white priming pushes forward through the paint to throw the color enriched light back to the viewer, and where the ground itself shows through its color. "The Swing" can be found at the Museum d'Orsayin Paris.
I also examined "Madame Charpentier and her children." I was pulled to this painting through Renoir's use of characters. The family is spending quality time together. The colors are vibrant and full of excitement one could expect from an Impressionist. The setting is thoroughly modern, but above all, the perspective is very daring. The subject is viewed from above, which tends to flatten the perceived picture surface and reduce the sense of depth, bringing the figures forward to the viewer rather than drawing the eye of the viewer into the picture to the subject. The surface of the painting is more alert and clear than in "The Swing." "Renoir painted Charpentier at home, without any of the furniture having been moved from where it stood everyday, without anything having been prepared to improve one part of the painting or another" (Guillou, 77). The viewer's eyes moves logically through the faces of the children upward to the mother. This painting can be found at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
Discussion/Analysis
Renoir painted mostly people instead of objects. He also painted most of the people in everyday life. In addition, most of the people in his paintings are happy, as represented with a smile. There are two different themes which I depict from Renoir's paintings. One is that people do not have to be doing anything extraordinary to be happy, they can just be swinging on a swing or sitting with their family. Th other is that a person can be happy in everyday life. Renoir's is a happy art, for as a man he was without bitterness and without jealousy.
Discussion of Style
The chief characteristic of Renoir's Impressionist period is that he succeeded in adding a sentimental atmosphere to the representation of nature and seemed to be just as charmed by a tender interlacing of his figures as by the play of foliage or of water. While his friends were chiefly attracted by landscape, his own performance was for group studies and paintings. Having painted the joy of the popular country cafes with music and dancing, he devoted himself to producing some of the most sumptuous images of Parisian society that have been left to us by his period.
Impact on the 20th Century
Renoir's work relates and influences the twentieth century. Most of his fine art is located in museums around the world, consequently many people can view the paintings. In Renoir's paintings, it is clear that love of painting and admiration for woman were only the double aspect of an unquie passion for living. Therefore, Renoir is saying that girls are equal to men, uncharacteristic of some of his life. Renoir left his mark on the twentieth century. Many people from around the world will be able to view his paintings and find out what made him great. That is, painting people who are happy
Choice of Artist
I chose this painter for a variety of reasons. First, I learned a little about Renoir in my French class, and I wanted to follow up that learning with research. Second, my English class talked about Impressionism and I wanted to choose a painting on that subject manner. Thirdly, when I viewed Renoir's paintings, the people in the painting were very happy. Renoir is considered one of the best painters of Impressionism of all time. "For me," Renoir liked to say, "a picture must be a pleasant thing, joyous and pretty-yes, pretty! There are too many unpleasant things in life for us to fabricate still more" (Jennings,147).
Bibliography
Barnes, Rachel. Renoir by Renoir. New York: Borzoi Books, 1990
Cogniat, Raymond. Impressionism. New York: Barron's Educational Series, Inc., 1979.
De Grada, Raffaele. Renoir. New York: Arch Cape Press, 1989
Guillou, Jean-Francois. Great Painters of the World. New York: Smithmark Publishers, 1993
Jennings, Guy. Renoir. New Jersey: Chartwell Books, Inc., 1988.
Pritzker, Pamela. Renoir. New York: Leon Amil Publishers, 1985
Stevenson, Lesley. Renoir. New York: Smithmark Publishers, 1991.
Tyler, Parker. Renoir. New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1968.
www.augusterenoir.com