Pierre-Auguste Renoir – Young Girls in Black

Young Girls in Black – two hats and one look towards us

Young Girls in Black is an oil painting by Pierre-Auguste Renoir from 1880. The original measures 81.3 x 65.2 cm, is recorded under inventory number Ж-3329 and is held by the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow. Our hand-painted painting Young Girls in Black is made in oil on canvas, in eight sizes from 65 x 80 to 140 x 170 cm.

A black that is not a flat area

Two young women in black coats and black hats sit at a table. The nearer faces us with her chin resting against her hand; the other is turned towards her, speaking. Behind them further figures dissolve into a soft blur, and on the table at the right stand a glass and a piece of fruit. The picture is almost entirely black — and it is in that black that Renoir finds blue, brown and violet.

Why hand-painted, not a print

Our version is not a print. In this subject the difference is at its clearest: the black is not one flat surface but a run of individual strokes of oil colour, laid side by side with a brush, which read differently as the light changes. The paint keeps the thickness of the load and the track of the bristles, which printed paper cannot imitate, so an oil painting on canvas behaves differently from a flat printed surface.

In the room

The subject is dark and quiet, so it works best in a room with light walls, where the black of the two coats separates from the ground: in an office, a dining room, or a living room with pale plaster. Because the painting holds the eye without loud colour, it can be hung where a brightly coloured subject would intrude. For an average wall 80 x 100 cm does the job, and above wide furniture we advise 100 x 120 cm, and on a tall wall 130 x 160 cm works. The middle sizes are 90 x 110 and 100 x 130 cm. Under 65 x 80 cm the two coats merge into a single dark area and the difference between the fabrics disappears, and with it the reason this scene was painted at all.

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. Young Girls in Black 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: two young women in black coats and hats at a table, Pierre-Auguste Renoir
• Technique: hand-painted oil painting on canvas, stretched on a wooden frame
• Sizes: 8 sizes, from 65 x 80 cm to 140 x 170 cm, another size on request
• Detail worth knowing: the black of the two coats is not one colour but a run of different darks – from close to you can see where the fabric changes

See also:

• Portrait of the Actress Jeanne Samary
• La Loge (The Theatre Box)
• In the Summer