Renoir, Pierre-Auguste
Pierre-August Renoir was born in Limoges, France, in 1841 but grew up in Paris where his family moved around 1845. His talent to draw was noticed in his childhood and at the age of thirteen, he started to decorate plates at a porcelain factory and painted fans and hanging for missionaries. In the evenings and weekends, Pierre-August frequented Louvre and took drawing and anatomy courses at the Ecole des Beaux Arts.
In 1862 Renoir started to attend painting classes set up by the Swiss artist Charles Gleyre (1806-1874), a student of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) where he met Alfred Sisley (1839-1899), Claude Monet (1840-1926) and Frédéric Bazille (1841-1870) who became his close friends. Pierre-August painted in the realist manner of the Barbizon school and started to exhibit his paintings at the Paris Salon from 1864. The first success came to him in 1868 but it did not last. As a result of it Renoir together with Sisley, Monet, Paul Cézanne (1839-1906), Edgar Degas (1834-1917) and others set up the Cooperative and Anonymous Association of Painters, Sculptors, and Engravers (“Société Anonyme Coopérative des Artistes Peintres, Sculpteurs, Graveurs “) to paint landscapes and contemporary scenes in the open air as opposed to studio painted mythological and historical subjects of the official Salon in 1873.
The first exhibition of the group was held at the studio of Nadar (1820-1910), the well-known photographer and journalist, and the artists were scathingly dubbed the Impressionists by Louis Leroy (1812-1885). Renoir’s works were received comparatively well and he received portrait commissions and his works were shown by famous Parisian dealer Paul Durand-Ruel (1831-1922). Pierre-August continued to use spontaneous and loose brushstrokes and exhibited at the second and third Impressionists exhibitions in 1876 and 1877. He became a fashionable portrait painter and exhibited at the Salon and had his personal exhibition at La Vie Moderne gallery in 1879.
In the 1880s Renoir travelled in Europe and particularly to Spain to see paintings by Diego Velázquez (1599-1660) in Madrid and to Italy to see works by Raphael (1483 -1520) in Florence. His style changed with an emphasis on drawing, lines and contour but his paintings never lost the spontaneity and colourfulness. In 1887 Renoir’s works were included in the “French Impressionist Paintings” catalogue printed to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria, the reigning British monarch.
In the 1890s and beyond Renoir’s paintings became more personal and intimate depicting family, gardens and nudes. He received universal recognition and the French state acquired “Portrait of Madame Georges Charpentier” for the Louvre in 1919. Pierre-August’s works represented in all the major art collections and museums worldwide.
