Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Durand-Ruel, Paris (acquired from the artist on December 31, 1890)
Frank Hadley Ginn & Cornelia Root Ginn, Cleveland (acquired from the above in April 1926)
Frank Hadley Ginn & Cornelia Root Ginn Charitable Trust (by descent from the above and sold: Christie's, New York, May 8, 2000, lot 5)
Acquired at the above sale

François Daulte, Auguste Renoir, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, vol. I, Lausanne, 1971, no. 592, illustrated n.p.
Guy-Patrice & Michel Dauberville, Renoir, Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vol. II, Paris, 2009, no. 1186, illustrated p. 312

This work is in particularly good condition. The canvas is unlined. The paint layer is stable. It is clean and lightly varnished. It shows no losses or retouches. Some strokes of pigment in the hair in the upper right fluoresce under ultraviolet light, but there is no retouching.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

The theme of the young woman at her toilette was a recurring motif in Renoir's oeuvre. Tête de jeune fille se coiffant, painted in 1890, displays the soft brushwork and nuanced palette that is so typical of Renoir's style. Using cool tones and fluid contours that underscore the extraordinary beauty of the sitter, Renoir organizes his composition with correlated colors to achieve a sense of formal unity and physical presence in an intimate scene.

The young sitter, depicted with the artist’s archetypal rosy cheeks, her porcelain skin almost translucent, is caught in the act of fixing her hair in a state of modest undress. The predominance of the cool blue tones evokes an intense lapis-lazuli, and the subject matter looks back to Renaissance portraiture, and in particular to Titian’s celebrated Donna allo specchio from circa 1515 (see fig. 1). Adopting the methods of an Old Master painter, Renoir becomes a voyeur in a moment of intimacy and explores the universal theme of the sitter’s ideal beauty with a hint of vanity. An ennobler of the mundane, Renoir painted for visual delight, engaging only with images of pleasure.

The poet Emile Verhaeren captures the essence of Renoir’s touch: “Here…is an utterly new vision, a quite unexpected interpretation of reality to solicit our imagination. Nothing is fresher, more alive and pulsating with blood and sexuality, then these bodies and faces as he portrays them. Where have they come from, those light and vibrating tones that caress arms, necks, and shoulders, and give a sensation of soft flesh and porousness? The backgrounds are suffusions of air and light, they are vague because they must not distract us” (quoted in Gerd Muesham, ed., French Painters and Paintings from the Fourteenth-Century to Post-Impressionism: A Library of Art Criticism, New York, 1970, pp. 511-12).