Two Sisters (On the Terrace)

Pierre-Auguste Renoir considered the Restaurant Fournaise in Chatou (a village along the Seine River) the perfect spot to enjoy nature and good company away from the urban distractions of Paris. His painting Two Sisters (On the Terrace), which he exhibited at the Impressionist exhibition of 1882, is among the last of his paintings set there.

Sometimes, as in his most famous work on this subject, Luncheon of the Boating Party (1882; Phillips Collection, Washington, DC), Renoir used his close friends as models. For Two Sisters, however, despite the title of the painting, he paid unrelated models to create this intimate and perfectly balanced pairing of youth and nature. The older girl, wearing the blue flannel of a female boater’s outfit, sports a luxurious red hat, but it is her younger companion who captivates. Her oversize headdress composed of a floral bouquet is echoed in the brightly colored skeins of yarn in the basket that she gently touches. As was typical for the artist, Renoir painted the faces of his models with controlled and precise brushwork creating a porcelain-like surface that contrasts brilliantly with the diaphanous, impressionist backdrop of river, boats, and blossoming trees just beyond the railing of the terrace.