The Late Renoir Exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum: A Master Comes of Age

The Large Bathers, 1918-1919, Oil on Canvas

Musee d'Orsay, Paris (on loan for the Late Renoir exhibit)

In 1913, at the age of 72 , Pierre Auguste Renoir ( 1841- 1919)

declared: "I'm starting to know how to paint. It has taken me over 50 years to get this far and I'm not done yet."

What is meant by this enigmatic statement?

A little background to this marvelous display of over 80 works:paintings, sculpture and drawings.

In 1881, Renoir visited Madrid to see Velazquez's paintings, thenon to Italy to see Titian's masterpieces in Florence and Raphael's works in Rome.

Viewing these painters, Renoir was inspired by classical Greek and Roman figures and themes. (he would later sculpt The Judgment of Paris and Large Washerwoman with Richard Guino doing the claymodeling)

Then in 1892, he developed rheumatoid arthritis and moved to 'Les Collettes' a farm in Cagnes-sur Mer close to Nice and the Mediterranean in southern France. In this locale, Renoir was seduced by the soft light of the Midi. More important, here was the ideal pastoral setting in which Renoir created an arcadian tableau inhabited by sensuous bathers, washerwomen and females deities.

There is a 'fruitful irony' that we witness at this key juncture in the artist's life- which just might illuminate Renoir's puzzling statement just alluded to.

As his arthritis lead to restricted movement of the joints of his hands and legs (he became wheel chair bound), he developed ankylosis of his right shoulder (stiff bent shoulder due to adhesion of the bones) and this lead to extreme discomfort.

Yet-- his work revels in a upbeat vibrancy of vivd bright colors.

Renoir didn't give up. He continued to paint with a relentless passion, perhaps unknown to him.

It is this artistic urge, this marvelous inner resource of spiritual strength the he used to overcome, surpass and minimize the extreme discomfort of his body ailments.

In short, Renoir celebrated his love of life, his joie de vivre with an ever increasing display of sensuality in the female body and in surrounding nature.

Painted just before he passed on, The Great Bathers (the Nymphs) of 1918-1919, pictured above, just might be the apotheosis of his ideal sensual woman (though there are many in the work and in so many other paintings and sculptures) in a corresponding sensual/pastoral universe filled with pinks, rosees and oranges.