Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Dance at Bougival

Or ‘Frenchy’ as his friends called him. I like him because he could do people. So many “painters” today just do boring old landscapes devoid of life, like that dead guy on PBS. Its hard for a painting to tell a story without people or animals. The other thing I liked about Renoir was he often used red to set off his main subject. I like red. The other thing he did was introduce me to someone he studied, Titian (Tiziano Vecelli or Vecellio. That guy was a painter too, I tell you what). I read Renoir was a soldier in a war with Germany in 1870 along with his friend Frédéric Bazille. A very important war, I’m sure. You remember what it was about don’t you? Why those young men died? Well Renoir survived. Bazille didn’t. Almost makes you wonder what never got painted by the young Bazille. What might he have painted if he had lived another 40 years?

Pierre-Auguste Renoir Tutt’Art@