Renoir, Pierre-Auguste (1841-1919)
La petite fille à l’arrosoir (A Girl with a Watering Can)
1876
Oil on canvas, 100 x 73 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington
In 1876, Renoir began to paint anecdotal depictions of women and children, subjects in which he excelled. A Girl with a Watering Can, typical of these works, displays a mature impressionist style attuned to the specific requirements of figure painting. Renoir‘s colors reflect the freshness and radiance of the impressionist palette, while his handling is more controlled and regular than in his landscapes, with even brushstrokes applied in delicate touches, especially in the girl’s face. Brilliant prismatic hues envelop the child in an atmosphere of warm light and charmingly convey her innocent appeal. Specific identifications have been proposed for the girl, but none is convincing. More likely, Renoir depicted a neighborhood child whose pretty features pleased him. A girl with similar curly blond hair, sparkling blue eyes, plump pink cheeks, and smiling red lips appears, dressed the same way in other paintings by Renoir, suggesting she was a favorite figure in the artist’s repertory. A Girl with a Watering Can is a showcase of the grace and charm of the artist’s work. A pale-skinned young girl with blond hair, wearing a blue dress, stands in a garden in this vertical painting. The girl and background are painted with blended strokes, giving the scene and especially the girl a soft look. She faces our right and stands in the middle of the composition. Her shoulder-length cloud of hair is topped with a red bow, and long bangs frame her round face. Under faint brows, her sapphire-blue eyes look to our right. She has a petite nose, and her coral-pink mouth turns up in a slight smile. Her cobalt-blue dress is trimmed with wide, blue-white lace on the neckline, across the bottom hem, and down the front to either side of a row of white buttons. The white edges her petticoats come down to just below her knees, peeking out from under the flaring skirt. She wears white socks over blue ankle boots, which also have a row of white buttons down the side we can see. Her near hand is raised with her index finger hooked in the handle of a green watering can, and she holds two daisies by her side in her other hand. She stands on a path flecked with ivory white, pale purples, greens, and pink that curves up and to her left. A bush with emerald and pine-green leaves dotted with pink blooms fills the lower left corner. Behind her, green grass runs back to meet a profusion of pink, purple, and poppy-red plants and flowers that run along the top edge of the composition. The artist signed and dated the lower right, “Renoir. 76.” (NGA)