ピエール＝オーギュスト・ルノワール

Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) painted light and female beauty with unmatched warmth. Starting as a porcelain painter's apprentice in Limoges before moving to Paris at three, he studied under Charles Gleyre and there befriended Monet and Sisley. In the late 1860s, working outdoors at La Grenouillère with Monet, he discovered how shadows reflect surrounding colors—a revelation central to Impressionism. He helped found the independent exhibitions of 1874, though critical derision stung.