The Reader (Young Woman Reading a Book)

The Reader (Young Woman Reading a Book) (Woman Reading)
Famous artist: Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Oil painting on canvas; Size: 46.5x38.5cm; Musee d'Orsay, Paris.

"I like pictures that make me want to walk around inside them, if they are landscapes, or to caress them, if they are of women ": for Renoir painting was not just a pleasure for the eyes, but for the touch as well. In this picture dating from 1874-76 Renoir treated the image of a woman reading, which for other painters of the second half of the 19th century symbolized female emancipation, as an opportunity to play with the effects of the sunshine on the girl's hair, to model the forms with light. "What I like is skin, the rosy skin of a girl that hints at the good circulation of her blood. And what I love above all is serenity." What pleased Renoir in women was their capacity to live in the present moment, their ability to "make life bearable." "I like women. They have no doubts about anything. With them the world becomes very simple. They give everything the right value and know very well that their washing is just as important as the constitution of the German empire. When you are with them you feel reassured!" But he also liked women who "don't know how to read and who clean their own baby's bottom." And he loved children, whose curiosity and capacity for wonder he shared. Loath to display his feelings, Renoir used his brush to caress the dimples of their cheeks, the folds in their wrists, and in this way, as his son Jean would recall, declared his paternal love to the world.