Pierre-Auguste Renoir – At the Theatre (La Première Sortie)

At the Theatre – a profile turned down towards the hall

At the Theatre (La Première Sortie) is an oil painting by Pierre-Auguste Renoir from 1876. The original measures 65.0 x 49.5 cm, is recorded under inventory number NG3859 and is held by The National Gallery in London. Our hand-painted painting At the Theatre is made in oil on canvas, in eight sizes from 60 x 80 to 120 x 160 cm.

The hall behind her, dissolved into strokes

A young woman in a dark blue coat and a pale bonnet trimmed with blue sits in a theatre box. We see her from the side and slightly behind, her face in profile, her look directed down into the auditorium; a small posy is held in her gloved hands. Beyond the front of the box the audience is painted as a dense flicker of unfinished faces and colour, and a second figure sits at her right. Only the girl is sharp — everything else is movement.

Why hand-painted, not a print

Our version is not a print. In this subject the difference is easy to see: the auditorium behind her is not a printed blur but a run of quick, separate strokes of oil colour laid side by side with a brush, while the face is built from fine, soft ones. The paint keeps that difference in handling, which printed paper cannot imitate, so an oil painting on canvas reads differently under changing light than a flat printed surface does.

In the room

The subject is blue-grey and quiet, so the painting does not take over a room and works well where the wall should stay calm: a living room, a bedroom or a hallway. Because the figure is in profile and looks downward, the scene addresses nobody and can be hung along a passage, where a look out of the painting would stop every passer-by each time. For a smaller wall 70 x 90 cm is enough, above a larger piece of furniture we suggest 90 x 120 cm, and on a tall wall 120 x 160 cm works. Between them stand 80 x 100 and 100 x 130 cm. Under 60 x 80 cm the hall behind her draws together into an even grey and the scene loses the place where it happens.

What you receive

We paint the canvas to order, by hand and for you alone, so every copy is made on its own; the canvas is usually painted and dried within three to four weeks. If you prefer, we will paint it in a size that is not on the list. Before despatch we send you a photograph of the finished canvas for your approval, and only then does the painting go out. At the Theatre (La Première Sortie) arrives stretched on a wooden frame and ready to hang, wrapped in protective film and in rigid packaging, with no further stretching or finishing needed.

• Subject: young woman in a theatre box, in profile, looking down into the hall, Pierre-Auguste Renoir
• Technique: hand-painted oil painting on canvas, stretched on a wooden frame
• Sizes: 8 sizes, from 60 x 80 cm to 120 x 160 cm, another size on request
• Detail worth knowing: the hall behind her is not painted as a space but as a run of quick separate strokes – the audience is movement, not faces

See also:

• La Loge (The Theatre Box)
• Young Girls in Black
• The Umbrellas