Favourite Paintings: 'The Skiff' by Renoir

'The Skiff' by Renoir is a favourite painting in the National Gallery. I've seen it many times and whenever I step into the room it's in my eyes are drawn to it by the gorgeous colours pulling at me. All those blues and greens with the slash of orange and yellow for the skiff itself. The painting shrieks of summer and sunshine and warmth with the dappled water and sun reflecting off everything. Those poor ladies in the boat must have been sweltering in all that sun with all those clothes, especially the rower.

I like looking at the details in the painting as well as absorbing the radiated heat. The railway bridge, the colourful house, the yacht, the indistinct people on the bank (partners of the ladies?), the clump of reeds. I love all the reflections in the water, spreading more colour into the water. It's also easy to see the brush-strokes, particularly in the water around the paddle. It looks like the waves were created by a brush simply dabbing at the canvas and the different shades create the dappled effect. It took me a long time to learn to look at the details in paintings rather than concentrate on the overall effect but it's very rewarding.

If you're in London it's well worth a visit to the National Gallery (enmasked, of course) to see this painting for yourself. Don't just glance at it, look at it.

'French Impressions' - Prints at the British Museum

The British Museum has just opened a new, small exhibition about prints-making by the Impressionists and their successors, 'French Impressions: Prints from Manet to Cezanne'. It's upstairs in Room 90, a single room, but it has some great works that are well worth seeing. They seem to be mainly lithographs, rather than other forms of print-making, with some etchings on display as well. I've seen many paintings by some of the artists featured in this exhibition, but those were in oil paints rather than the mainly monochrome prints so it's interesting to see how they manage with a largely monochrome palette.

One of the first prints I saw was a lovely small portrait of the painter Berthe Morisot that also serves as the picture for the poster of the exhibition. It's by Manet, who was friend of hers. You've probably heard of Manet but possibly not heard of Morisot. I saw an exhibition of her works a few years back in Paris and all the exhibits were small, warm and very welcoming. Morisot also has a couple of prints in the exhibition that were more like line drawings, quite delicate and small, one of which was a self-portrait with her daughter.

One of the more experimental print-makers was Degas and there's one of his 'bather' prints on display. Apparently the first time he made this print if came out too dark so all the detail was lost so he scraped it clean and tried again and this is the result. Not as feminine as his pastels but still, obviously, a Degas.

There was, of course, the inevitable print by Toulouse-Lautrec but the one that surprised me was a portrait by Vincent Van Gogh of Dr Gachet, with whom he was staying in Auvers after his release from the mental asylum. It's an etching and is Van Gogh's only etching which he gave to the doctor and his son donated it to the British Museum in 1923. Apparently Dr Gachet taught Vincent how to etch.  

There were a few other portraits in the exhibition and one of my favourites was a portrait of the art dealer Ambroise Vollard by Renoir, a lithograph from 1904. They were friends and I think this comes across in the portrait which seems quite gentle and intimate.

Another portrait I liked was a self-portrait by Cezanne. Apparently Cezanne only made eight prints and this is a lithograph self-portrait from around 1896. He also knew Dr Gachet and stayed with him in Auvers in 1873 (it was a smaller world back then). This doesn't look like any of Cezanne's other self-portraits which were all painted in oil  but is really quite charming, sitting in front of a canvas (or mirror?) he was working on. There was a great exhibition of his portraiture a few years ago that I saw in Paris and in London and it's a great shame that this print wasn't included in it - it would've helped shed more light on his approach to portraiture.

In the display case beside the self-portrait was another of Cezanne's rare prints, this time a print of one of his 'Bathers'.

A final print I'll highlight is a colourful one to show that they also used colour back then and not everything was monochrome. This is another lithograph by Henri Gabriel Ibels from 1893, 'At The Circus, The Clown'. Lovely warm colours and simple lines and so very effective.

If you're in the area you could do worse than pop in to see the exhibition - it's free!

'Inventing Impressionism' at the National Gallery

Last week we went to see the new exhibition at the National Gallery on the Impressionists. I'm not the biggest fan of the Impressionists - they've been far too ubiquitous and their paintings have found their way onto greetings cards and biscuit tins. I've walked quickly through the Impressionist galleries at the Musee D'Orsay in Paris because I've seen too many and felt like I was drowning in their paintings. They're everywhere.

And maybe that's why this exhibition is so good since there is no filler. It's themed around the collection of Paul Durand-Ruel, the art dealer who nearly bankrupted himself twice through his love of the paintings and support of the artists. All but one of the 85 paintings in the exhibition went through his hands at some point. He championed the new style of painting and almost single-handedly invented the idea of the solo exhibition. Holding exhibitions in London and New York took Impressionism international and eventually secured the funding they needed to keep painting and their reputations down the years.

The exhibition opens with two lovely paintings by Renoir of Durand-Ruel's children, sons sitting together and daughters sitting together, full of life and colour with their whole lives ahead of them. I liked the painting of the girls with the posy of flowers and bright hat, with the red flowers matching the red lining of the hat. They're having a chat and just look up to see themselves being painted. I wonder what they got up to in their later lives and whether they were happy?

I've never been that keen on Renoir before but I liked the paintings in this exhibition, not just the paintings of the Durand-Ruel's but there are three of his life sized 'dance' paintings in the exhibition as well. My favourite was 'Dance In The Country' if only because of the face of the young girl - she's clearly found the love of her life and the exuberance of the dance has taken her to another level. It's a lovely painting and made me smile.

Of course, the Impressionists are famed for their landscapes in which they painted light. There are paintings by Pissarro, Sisley, Monet and more, mainly set in spring and summer but also a few set in winter with snow on the ground and leaden skies. One of my favourites was 'Entrance to the Village of Voisin' by Pissarro with his classic tall thin trees casting shadows - this picture doesn't do it justice since to my eyes he was painting the light in, around and covering the landscape, rather than painting the landscape itself. It's quite a marvellous painting.

It was also lovely to see his small paintings of Sydenham and Upper Norwood from his years in and around London.

There are some gorgeous paintings my Monet, including five paintings from his 'Poplars' series, a beautiful painting of his garden with a courting couple in the background and this magical painting, 'Road at La Cavee, Pourville'. It's a lovely painting that draws you in as you gaze at it, wandering down a dusty path between two banks of grass and tiny flowers, down and round a hill towards the sea. But what is just round that corner? What surprise or adventure awaits the dreamer who just follows that path. I imagined a pirate ship sailing into view from behind the trees, coming to whisk me off an adventure on the high seas. It's a magical image that draws you in - I'd like to step into that painting and wander off down the road…

There are also paintings of everyday life and the everyday life of certain groups of people. We see Degas's racehorse paintings and the delightful 'Miss La La at the Cirque Fernando', swinging from a rope hanging from the ceiling. I like Miss La La for her athleticism, her bravery and her strong teeth. The painting is all about capturing movement, the feeling of her spinning around at the end of the rope and Degas has caught a split second of her act. Painted from below adds to the sense of height and danger and makes her an exotic character. Interestingly, we don't see her face. I wonder if he ever painted her with her face showing - I'm intrigued.

There's a lot to make you think in this exhibition and it seems to have been well thought out with text on the walls to give you an idea of what was going on and which exhibitions the paintings were part of. And slowly, the Impressionists started to become appreciated, welcomed and then lauded.

The final room includes the later paintings of some of the Impressionists and one that really grabbed my attention was 'Two Sisters (on the Terrace)' by Renoir - yes, another Renoir painting! It's the red hat that calls to me across the room, then the flowers on the little girl's hat and the flowers in the older sister's lap. They're a riot of dashes of colour brining fresh flowers to life against the greens in the background and the dark dress. I couldn't help but move over to that painting, by-passing some of the others to get lost in those impossible flowers. Nothing can be that colourful - I don't believe it but there they are, captured in paint forever. This picture doesn't do them justice at all - it's always so much better to see the real thing in front of you.

Also in that final room, on the wall beside the exit door is a quote from Paul Durand-Ruel from 1920: "At last the Impressionist masters triumphed… My madness had been wisdom". I like that quote. He honours the painters by calling them 'masters' and saying that they 'triumphed'. He also notes that his own judgement had been right all along.

This is a really good exhibition and is a must. If you visit only one exhibition in April go to this one. If you love the Impressionists you'll see new things to love and if you're ambivalent towards them, then this might make you think twice. Basing it around the life and collection of Paul Durand-Ruel is an inspired idea and it's great to see these wonderful paintings together in the same exhibition.

I'll leave you with 'The Artist's Garden in Argenteuil' by Monet. Let your eyes drink in those flowers and bushes and then wonder what that courting couple in the distance are talking about...