Tête de femme blonde 1908

Pierre-Auguste Renoir made this oil-on-canvas painting, Tête de femme blonde. Renoir was one of the central figures in the development of Impressionism in France. As a movement, Impressionism was about representing modern life. However, Renoir took a turn away from the explicitly modern subject matter of artists such as Monet and Degas and focused primarily on the nude and the female figure. His paintings often evoke the old master tradition. This shift arguably made his paintings more palatable to establishment tastes. The art market in France at this time was dominated by the state-sponsored Salon system. Artists like Renoir had to negotiate the politics of the art world. By referencing the past, Renoir was able to satisfy institutional expectations of fine art, while still experimenting with the techniques of impressionism. By looking at Renoir's biography and the records of exhibitions at the time, we can better understand his relationship to the art world of Paris.