id: 149014 accession number: 1977.167 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1977.167 updated: 2025-04-29 11:06:20.109000 Laundress and Her Child (Aline and Pierre), c. 1886. Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841–1919). Pastel on brown paper; sheet: 81.5 x 65 cm (32 1/16 x 25 9/16 in.); mounted: 82.6 x 65.9 cm (32 1/2 x 25 15/16 in.); framed: 99 x 82.5 x 4.2 cm (39 x 32 1/2 x 1 5/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Bequest of Alexander Ginn, 1977.167 title: Laundress and Her Child (Aline and Pierre) title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: c. 1886 creation date earliest: 1881 creation date latest: 1891 current location: creditline: Bequest of Alexander Ginn copyright: --- culture: France, 19th century technique: pastel on brown paper department: Drawings collection: DR - French type: Drawing find spot: catalogue raisonne: Dauberville 1394 --- CREATORS * Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841–1919) - artist Renoir's parents, a tailor and a dressmaker, moved their family to Paris in 1844. At age thirteen Renoir apprenticed with the porcelain decorators Levy Frères & Cie. He earned money by painting fans, blinds, and murals for cafés. In 1860 he registered to copy Old Master paintings in the Louvre and, the following year, entered the studio of Charles Gleyre (1806-1874), where he met Frédéric Bazille (1841-1870), Monet (q.v.), and Sisley (q.v.). In 1862 he was also accepted at the École des Beaux-Arts. With his friends from Gleyre's studio, he began working en plein air and, during a visit to the forest of Fontainebleau, was introduced to Diaz de la Peña (q.v.). After a failed attempt in 1863, Renoir's first painting was accepted at the Salon of 1864, the same year he painted Cleveland's portrait of Romaine Lacaux. More typical of this early period, however, is the painting Diana the Huntress (1867, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.), which reveals Courbet's (q.v.) influence. Around 1867 Renoir shared a studio with Bazille and Monet, the latter becoming an important influence on his art. Renoir and Monet's comparable impressionist style during this period is evident in two paintings each made at La grenouillère (all four titled La grenouillère, 1869: Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, and Pushkin Museum, Moscow [Renoir]; National Gallery, London, and Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York [Monet]),1 a bathing establishment on the Seine. After Renoir's military service during the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), Monet introduced him to the dealer Durand-Ruel, who began purchasing his works. Renoir's submissions to the Salon were regularly refused, which encouraged him to participate in the first impressionist exhibition in 1874 and the 1875 auction at Hôtel Drouot, where his works were ridiculed by the critics. At the third impressionist exhibition in 1877, he showed Ball at the Moulin de la Galette (1876, Musée d'Orsay, Paris), in which he addressed a subject of modern life, one of his most characteristic impressionist paintings on a grand scale, with a rich pattern of light and shadow. In 1878 he returned to the Salon and became quite successful, establishing his reputation as a portraitist (1878, Mme Charpentier and her Children, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York). He continued to use this official venue for the next several years, declining to exhibit with the impressionists. This decision was partly generated by the fact that his newfound clientele would be more appreciative of his participating in the Salon. He was supported by his patrons, particularly the Charpentiers, owners of a publishing house, whose journal La vie moderne furthered Renoir's reputation. After a trip to North Africa and Italy in 1881, he joined Cézanne at L'Estaque. Throughout the 1880s and 1890s Renoir traveled extensively through Brittany, Normandy, Provence, and Spain. In the mid-1880s he began to experiment with more linear contours, the application of thinner paint layers, and smoother brush strokes. This so-called Ingresque period, which had a very mixed reception, lasted for about six years. He then reflected upon the achievements of the Old Masters and favored a more fluid style, after which he returned to using broader brush strokes and more vibrant colors. In 1886 he was given a one-man show by Durand-Ruel. By 1900 Renoir was an established artist: he became Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in 1900 and four years later was honored at the Salon d'Automne with a gallery devoted to his works. Beginning in 1912 he suffered from rheumatism and began using a wheelchair, yet he continued to work until the end of his life. He now often stayed in southern France, where he owned property in Cagnes-sur-Mer. Renoir regularly exhibited his works at the Durand-Ruel and Bernheim-Jeune galleries in Paris, as well as elsewhere in Europe and in the United States. --- measurements: Sheet: 81.5 x 65 cm (32 1/16 x 25 9/16 in.); Mounted: 82.6 x 65.9 cm (32 1/2 x 25 15/16 in.); Framed: 99 x 82.5 x 4.2 cm (39 x 32 1/2 x 1 5/8 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: inscription: stamped, lower right, in black ink: Renoir [Lugt 2137b] translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Year in Review for 1984 opening date: 1985-04-03T05:00:00 Year in Review for 1984. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (April 3-May 5, 1985). title: Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2000-08-27T00:00:00 Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 27-October 17, 2000). title: Monet to Dalí: Modern Masters from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2006-05-27T00:00:00 Monet to Dalí: Modern Masters from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 21, 2007-January 13, 2008). title: Mary Cassatt and the Feminine Ideal in 19th-Century Paris opening date: 2012-10-04T00:00:00 Mary Cassatt and the Feminine Ideal in 19th-Century Paris. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (October 14, 2012-January 20, 2013). title: Pure Color: Pastels from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2016-11-19T05:00:00 Pure Color: Pastels from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 19, 2016-March 19, 2017). title: Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2023-01-19T05:00:00 Nineteenth-Century French Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 20-June 11, 2023). title: Degas and the Laundress: Women, Work, and Impressionism opening date: 2023-10-08T04:00:00 Degas and the Laundress: Women, Work, and Impressionism. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 8, 2023-January 14, 2024). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE (Georges Petit, Paris) date: after 1886-1890 footnotes: citations: (Durand-Ruel, Paris, transferred to Durand-Ruel, New York) date: 1890-1926 footnotes: citations: (Durand-Ruel, New York) date: 1926 footnotes: citations: (Reinhardt Galleries, New York) date: after 1926-1929 footnotes: citations: (Durand-Ruel, New York) date: 1929 footnotes: citations: Mr. [1868–1938] and Mrs. Frank Ginn, Cleveland, by descent to Alexander Ginn, Cleveland date: 1929-1938 footnotes: citations: Alexander Ginn [d. 1999], Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1938-1977 footnotes: citations: Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1977- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS André, Albert. Renoir. Paris: G. Crès and Cie., 1928. page number: Reproduced: pl. 35 url: “Lists of Objects in the Exhibition.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 16, no. 9 (1929): 159–75. page number: Mentioned: p. 162 url: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25137248. Florisoone, Michel. Renoir. Translated by George Frederic Lees. Paris: Hyperion, 1938. page number: Mentioned: p. 66; Reproduced: p. 71 url: Drucker, Michel. Renoir. Paris: Pierre Tisné, 1944. page number: Mentioned: pp. 187, 206, no. 82; Reproduced: pl. 82 url: Rewald, John. Renoir Drawings. New York: H. Bittner, 1946. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 20, no. 46 url: Drawings from the Collection of Louis C. G. Clarke, LL. D., 1881–1960. Exh. cat. Cambridge, UK: Fitzwilliam Museum, 1981. page number: Mentioned: p. 81 url: White, Barbara Ehrlich. Renoir: His Life, Art, and Letters. New York: Abrams, 1984.. page number: Mentioned: pp. 175-76, 179; Reproduced: p. 178 url: Ikegami, Chūji. Kōki inshōha jidai. Tōkyō: Shōgakukan, 1993. page number: Mentioned: p. 387, no. 28; Reproduced: p. 46 url: Néret, Gilles. Renoir: Painter of Happiness, 1841–1919. Cologne: Taschen, 2001. page number: Mentioned: pp. 365, 377; Reproduced: p. 367 url: Collins, John. “Charigot, Aline.” In Dictionary of Artists’ Models, edited by Jill Berk Jiminez. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2001. page number: Mentioned: p. 117 url: Dumas, Ann and John Collins. Renoir's Women. Exh. cat. Columbus: Columbus Museum of Art, 2005. page number: Mentioned: p. 59, 120; Reproduced: p. 57 url: Dauberville, Guy-Patrice and Michel Dauberville. Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles. Paris: Éditions Bernheim-Jeune, 2007. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: vol. 3, p. 445, no. 1394 url: Amiot-Saulnier, Emmanuelle. Renoir: Pastels, crayons, sanguines, aquarelles. Paris: Hazan, 2009. page number: Mentioned: pp. 44, 120, no. 31; Reproduced: p. 121 url: Lucy, Martha. “Washerwoman and Child.” In Martha Lucy and John House, Renoir in the Barnes Foundation. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012. page number: Mentioned: p. 115; Reproduced: p. 117 url: Groom, Gloria and Jill Shaw, eds. Renoir Paintings and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2014. page number: Mentioned: para. 14; Reproduced: fig. 6.9 url: https://www.artic.edu/digital-publications/renoir-paintings-and-drawings-at-the-art-institute-of-chicago Perrin, Paul. “Madame Renoir.” In Lamia Guillaume, ed., Un autre Renoir. Exh. cat. Troyes: Musée d’Art Moderne, 2017. page number: Mentioned: p. 45 url: White, Barbara Ehrlich. Renoir: An Intimate Biography. London: Thames and Hudson, 2017. page number: Mentioned: pp. 145, 375n9, 377n60 url: Le Foll, Joséphine. L’Impressionnisme. Paris: Citadelles and Mazenod, 2020. page number: Reproduced: p. 312 url: Salsbury, Britany, Edgar Degas, and William Griswold. Degas and the Laundress: Women, Work, and Impressionism. 2023. page number: Reproduced: p. 168, no. 50 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1977.167/1977.167_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1977.167/1977.167_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1977.167/1977.167_full.tif