News Item: 00052

12th Mar 2008

Renoir's 'Young Woman in White Reading' on view

Source: http://www.nationalgallery.ie

The National Gallery of Ireland has today (Wednesday, March 12th 2008) placed on view its recent acquisition, 'Young Woman in White Reading' by French nineteenth-century master, Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919). The painting, which is the first Renoir to enter the collection, was purchased at auction, at Sotheby's Sale of Impressionist & Modern Art in New York (November 2007).

Janet McLean, the National Gallery's Curator of European Art 1850-1950, says that this recent acquisition is considered a fine example of the artist's work and will strengthen the Gallery's collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist art.

Painted in 1873, the painting depicts a fashionably dressed woman seated on a sofa absorbed in a book. The sitter is unknown, although it may portray Camille Monet, wife of the artist Claude Monet. Capturing an informal, everyday moment with an immediate accuracy, the painting also anticipates the motif of the intimate interior, as represented in Bonnard's 'Boy eating cherries', and 'Le dejeuner' both in the Gallery's collection.

Renoir's 'Young Woman in White Reading' will be on permanent display to the public from Thursday, March 13th 2008. In May, it will form part of the Gallery's summer exhibition, 'Impressionist Interiors', which will feature well-known paintings by all the major artists such as Manet, Monet, Gauguin, Degas, Vuillard, Bonnard and Pissarro.