Description
Pierre-Auguste Renoir – A Nymph by a Stream
| Year of creation: | 1869–1870 |
| Original size: | 66.7 cm x 122.9 cm |
| Painting style: | Impressionism |
| Original technique: | Oil on canvas |
| Located: | National Gallery, London |
A young nude figure lies right across the width of the canvas on a mossy bank beside water. With her left hand she catches the jet running from a stone, and she turns her head towards the viewer; a blue ribbon is tied in her hair. Dark foliage leans over her, and to the right the bank opens into pale green grass scattered with white flowers. The signature “A. Renoir” is painted in the lower right corner.
The painting was made in 1869 and 1870, early in Renoir’s career, when he was painting beside the Seine with Monet. The body is smooth and pale, almost porcelain-like, while the setting is laid in quickly and broadly — two ways of painting on one canvas. A mythological title was, at the time, the usual way to make a nude exhibitable at all.
The original measures 66.7 cm x 122.9 cm and is oil on canvas. It is held by the National Gallery in London under inventory number NG5982; the gallery bought it in 1951.
Our version is a hand-painted oil reproduction on canvas. Every canvas is painted individually to order, so no two are exactly alike. It is available in eight sizes, from 80 x 45 cm to 170 x 90 cm. It is a painting in oils, not a print.
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