This delicious head¹ of one of Renoir’s girl models—with the typical pug nose, protruding upper lip, sleepy eyes and pearly skin, seen through the clear French (or so it was then, and in Renoir’s case) varnish of sensual affection—is a bequest of Mrs. Harold O. Hunt. It is not a painting of great historical importance, it is not a great monument in Renoir’s career. Which is too bad for history and bravo for Renoir.Endnotes

1. Renoir (1814-1919) did not date the painting but it is perhaps of the late 1890s.

Referenced Work of Art

1. Pierre Auguste Renoir, French, 1841-1919. Head of a Girl, c. 1890. Oil on canvas, 14” x 12”. Bequest of Margaret Washburn Hunt, 1961. 61.15.