RENOIR: Lunch at The Maison Fournaise
Parisians would flock to Chatou’s Maison Fournaise to rent rowing skiffs, eat a good meal, or stay the night. In 1857, the entrepreneur Alphonse Fournaise bought land in Chatou to open a boat rental, restaurant, and small hotel for the new tourist trade. From the mid 1870s, Renoir often visited the Maison Fournaise to enjoy its convivial atmosphere and rural beauty. He painted scenes of the restaurant, as well as several portraits of Fournaise family members and landscapes of the surrounding area. In fact, Renoir occasionally traded paintings with the Fournaise family for food and lodging.
KLIMT: Fulfillment
Gustav Klimt (1862 – 1918) was an Austrian Symbolist painter and one of the most prominent members of the Vienna Art Nouveau (Vienna Secession) movement. His major works include paintings, murals, sketches and other art objects, many of which are on display in the Vienna Secession gallery. Klimt’s primary subject is the female body, and his works are marked by a frank eroticism. His pencil drawings, which are very numerous, have been regarded by many as his greatest legacy. The original masterpiece was created in 1905 ... the original oil copy in the house was carefully recreated detail-by-detail, color-by-color to near perfection.
DEGAS: Russian Dancers
Hand-painted oil reproduction of a famous Degas painting, the original masterpiece was created in 1895. Edgar Degas was born in Paris in 1834 and studied art from a young age. His most popular paintings were and still are his ballerina paintings like The Dance Class, Star Dancer (On Stage), and Dance Studio at the Opera. Asymmetrical compositions like Two Dancers on Stage show the influence of the Japanese prints in which Degas became interested. His painting career was prematurely ended by failing eyesight, and he died in Paris in 1917. This work of art in the Dome Home has the same emotions and beauty as the original.
VAN GOGH: The Harvest
Hand painted oil reproduction of a famous Van Gogh painting. The original masterpiece was created in 1888. Vincent Van Gogh’s restless spirit and depressive mental state fired his artistic work with great joy and, sadly, equally great despair. Known as a prolific Post-Impressionist, he produced many paintings that were heavily biographical. This work of art hanging in the Dome Home has the same emotions and beauty as the original.
MONET: Water Lilies
Hand-painted oil reproduction of a famous Monet painting, Water Lilies. The original masterpieces were created between 1914 and 1917. During these years, Monet’s cataracts got progressively worse but that seemed to have little effect on his sense of color and harmony.
Today it has been carefully recreated detail-by-detail, color-by-color to near perfection. While Monet successfully captured life’s reality in many of his works, his aim was to analyze the ever-changing nature of color and light. Known as the classic Impressionist, Monet cannot help but inspire deep admiration for his talent in those who view his work. The original oil copy hanging in the living room is a work of art that has been enlarged to a mural of 120x90 inches. It has the same emotions and beauty as the original.
VAN GOGH: Field with Poppies
Hand-painted oil reproduction of one of the most famous Van Gogh paintings, Field with Poppies. The original masterpiece was created in 1889. Today it has been carefully recreated detail-by-detail, color-by-color to near perfection. Vincent Van Gogh’s restless spirit and depressive mental state fired his artistic work with great joy and, sadly, equally great despair.
Known as a prolific Post-Impressionist, he produced many paintings that were heavily biographical. This work of art hanging in the Dome Home has the same emotions and beauty as the original by Van Gogh.
MATISSE: The Red Room
Hand-painted oil reproduction of a famous Matisse painting. The original masterpiece was created in 1940s. Today it has been carefully recreated detail by detail, color by color to near perfection. Like Picasso, Matisse is known to be one of the foremost artists of modern times. After a short bout of illness, Matisse gave up the study of law to take up painting. He was one of the pioneers of Fauvism, a style utilizing vivid color for its sensual and decorative value. This work of art has the same emotions and beauty as the original.
RENOIR: Luncheon of the Boating Party
Not only does this work convey the light-hearted leisurely mood of the Maison Fournaise but also reflects the character of mid- to late-nineteenth-century French social structure. The restaurant welcomed customers of many classes, including bourgeois businessmen, society women, artists (Renoir and Caillebotte), actresses, writers (Guy de Maupassant), critics and, with the new, shorter work week--a result of the industrial revolution--seamstresses and shop girls. This diverse group embodied a new, modern Parisian society that accepted, as it continued to develop and advanced the French Revolution’s promise of liberté, egalité, fraternité.
For Renoir enthusiasts, two publications devoted to this painting have appeared in the past year or two.
"Renoir: Luncheon of the Boating Party" is a 4-fold paperback of fascinating in-depth study of Renoir’s popular painting, revealing little-known compositional changes.
# ISBN-10: 1857592913
# ISBN-13: 978-1857592917
Best-selling author Susan Vreeland’s "Luncheon of the Boating Party" (hardcover) tracks Renoir as he conceives, plans and paints the 1880 masterpiece that gives her vivid fourth novel its title. There are, basically, three levels of "atmosphere" swirling through the pages of this riveting, complex novel: Renoir’s issues in composing the painting, the separate and interconnected lives of the 14 individuals appearing in it, and the spirit of la vie moderne--the new modes of living, thinking and expressing as conducted by the French arts community at the time.
# ISBN-10: 0670038547
# ISBN-13: 978-0670038541
With a masterful use of gesture and expression, Renoir painted youthful, idealized portraits of his friends and colleagues who frequented the Maison Fournaise. In the background and wearing a top hat, the wealthy amateur art historian, collector, and editor of the Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Charles Ephrussi (no. 8) speaks with a younger man wearing a more casual brown coat and cap who may be Jules Laforgue (no. 5), the poet, critic, and personal secretary to Ephrussi. In the center, the actress Ellen Andrée (no. 6) drinks from a glass, while seated across from her and dressed in a brown bowler hat, Baron Raoul Barbier (no. 4), a bon vivant and former mayor of colonial Saigon, faces the smiling woman leaning on the railing thought to be Alphonsine Fournaise (no. 3), the daughter of the proprietor. Wearing traditional straw boaters’ hats, both she, and her brother, Alphonse Fournaise Jr. (no. 2), who was responsible for the boat rentals and stands at the far left of the composition, are placed within, but at the edge, of the party.
Also sporting boaters’ hats are the artist Paul Lhote (no. 12) and the bureaucrat Eugène Pierre Lestringez (no. 11). These close friends of Renoir, who often modeled for his paintings, seem to be flirting with the fashionably dressed, famous actress Jeanne Samary (no. 13) in the upper right-hand corner. Lhote is not the only artist represented in Luncheon of the Boating Party; Renoir also included a youthful portrait of his fellow artist, close friend and wealthy patron, Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894) (no. 9), who sits backwards in his chair in the right foreground and is grouped with the actress Angèle (no. 7) and the Italian journalist Maggiolo (no. 10). Caillebotte, an avid boatman and sailor who painted many images of these activities, is portrayed in a white boater’s shirt and flat-topped straw boater’s hat. Caillebotte gazes across the table at a young woman, affectionately cooing at her dog, who is Aline Charigot (no. 1), the young seamstress Renoir had recently met and would later marry.
The Process Behind the Painting
For most viewers and admirers of Renoir’s Luncheon of the Boating Party, the artist’s process appears at first glance to be one of spontaneity and freshness. Consistent with the image of Impressionism as an art of direct observation, this work captures the fleeting effects of light and color. Renoir was so successful in bringing together a large group of figures into a singular, believable image of a charmed moment in time that it requires careful visual examination of the painting’s composition to fully understand his artistic achievement.
Detailed observation of the paint surface reveals the high level of skill in the techniques of oil painting that Renoir had developed by this point in his career. The character of his brushwork varies from brightly colored, thickly applied paint in the still life on the table, to the feathered brushstrokes of the landscape in the background. In the figures, Renoir has used firm outlines and subtle gradations of light and dark to clearly define the three-dimensional character of the human body, and the specific details of the facial features.
In order to create such a complex work, an artist often begins with sketches on paper or small painted studies. Such preparatory works often provide valuable insights into the artist’s creative process. Unfortunately, no drawings, oil studies, or any other preparatory exercises specific to Luncheon of the Boating Party are known to exist. All that remains of Renoir’s process is embedded in the layers of paint on the canvas itself.
Recent technical studies, including x-radiography and infrared reflectography, have shown that Renoir made numerous changes to the canvas as he worked on the painting over a period of months. A letter written by the artist during the autumn of 1880 also indicates that he worked on individual figures as his models were available to pose for him and that he was struggling to resolve the final grouping of figures, the table setting, and the landscape. In recounting his progress, he complained of being behind schedule, of having to remove a figure (“in a word, today I’ve wiped her out”), and of his frustration with this ambitious project: “. . . I no longer know where I am with it, except that it is annoying me more and more.”
Renoir persevered however, making changes that range from fine adjustments to the position of individual figures, to major additions, such as the red and white awning at the upper left. This change can be detected by the naked eye, in the pentimento around the hat of the bearded man under the awning at the left. The importance of this change can be understood when the viewer attempts to envision the painting without the awning. If an open sky and distant landscape had been retained, the three-dimensional illusion would have been difficult to achieve. By enclosing the top edge, the balcony’s recession into space is more convincing, and the sitters are better defined as a cohesive group.
Although there is no documentation, Renoir presumably executed some of the work on the balcony of the Maison Fournaise. It is not, in any case, a work of art painted entirely out of doors, known as a plein air painting. The lengthy process of changing the composition and reworking the painting mostly occurred in the studio. Nevertheless, Renoir retained the freshness of his vision, even as he revised, rearranged and created an exquisitely crafted work of art.
As you may be able to tell, this painting is the current owner’s favorite. The original oil copy hanging in the dining area has been carefully recreated detail-by-detail, color-by-color to near perfection.
