Artwork- Moulin de la Galette
Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette (Bal du moulin de la Galette), 1876, Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Renoir's paintings are notable for their vibrant light and saturated colour, most often focusing on people in intimate and candid compositions. The female nude was one of his primary subjects. In characteristic Impressionist style, Renoir suggested the details of a scene through freely brushed touches of colour, so that his figures softly fuse with one another and their surroundings.
His initial paintings show the influence of the colourism of Eugène Delacroix and the luminosity of Camille Corot. He also admired the realism of Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, and his early work resembles theirs in his use of black as a color.
One of the best known Impressionist works is Renoir's 1876 Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette (Bal du moulin de la Galette). The painting depicts an open-air scene, crowded with people, at a popular dance garden on the Butte Montmartre, close to where he lived.
Dance at le Moulin de la Galette is also known as Bal du moulin de la Galette and it is hailed as one of Renoir's most important works of the mid 1870s. The Moulin de la Galette was an open-air dancehall and café that was frequented by many artists living in Paris. Renoir attended Sunday afternoon dances and enjoyed watching the happy couples. For him, it provided the perfect setting for a painting.
Most of the figures featured in Dance at le Moulin de la Galette were Renoir's friends, but he also used a few professional models. Thus, it can be said that the scene he depicts is not a realistic representation of the Moulin's clientele, but rather an organized set of portraits.
This painting was first shown at the Impressionist exhibition of 1877 and demonstrated the original technique developed by Renoir. This canvas shows Renoir's friends, Frank Lamy, Norbert Goeneutte, and Georges Rivière gathered around the central table. Rivière, a writer who knew Renoir well at this time, wrote a review of Dance at le Moulin de la Galette in the journal L'Iimpressionniste which accompanied its exhibition. The writer referred to Dance at le Moulin de la Galette as a "page of history, a precious and strictly accurate portrayal of Parisian life. " Yet, others were not so kind. Many contemporary critics regarded this canvas as merely a blurred impression of the scene.
Known for his pleasant paintings, Dance at le Moulin de la Galette is regarded as one of the happiest compositions in Renoir's oeuvre. Today, it is on display at the Musee d'Orsay in Paris and is one the most celebrated works in the history of Impressionism.
