Pierre-Auguste Renoir
French, 1841–1919
Père Fournaise
1875
Alphonse Fournaise owned a restaurant and boat-rental business on an island in the river Seine near Paris. The proprietor may have commissioned this portrait to thank Renoir, a regular customer, for bringing in business. The painting records an informal moment: Fournaise smokes his pipe at a table on which two glasses of beer stand—one for the sitter and one, perhaps, for the painter.
| Medium | oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 22 1/8 x 18 1/2 in. (56.2 x 47 cm) Frame: 27 5/8 x 24 3/8 in. (70.2 x 61.9 cm) |
| Object Number | 1955.55 |
| Acquisition | Acquired by Sterling and Francine Clark before 1955 |
| Status | On View |
Image Caption
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Père Fournaise, 1875, oil on canvas. Clark Art Institute, 1955.55
Select Bibliography
Néret, Gilles. Renoir: Painter of Happiness 18411919. Cologne: Taschen GmbH, 2001.
New York: Durand-Ruel Galleries.. Loan Exhibition of Portraits by Renoir.. March 29-April 15, 1939..
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Exhibit Four: First Two Rooms. Exhibition catalogue. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1955.
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute.. Exhibit Six: Impressionist Paintings.. Opened Sept. 18, 1956..
Kern, Steven, et al. A Passion for Renoir: Sterling and Francine Clark Collect, 19161951. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., in association with the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1996
Washington: The Phillips Collection.. Impressionists on the Seine: A Celebration of Renoir's "Luncheon of the Boating Party." Sept. 21, 1996-Feb. 9, 1997. Cat. by Eliza E. Rathbone et al.
François Fosca.. Renoir.. Paris.. 1923..
Théodore Duret.. Renoir.. Paris.. 1924..
Julius Meier-Graefe.. Renoir.. Leipzig: Klinkhardt & Biermann.. 1929..
Michel Florisoone.. Renoir.. Paris.. 1937..
Frankfurter, Alfred M. "The Portraiture of Renoir: An Important Exhibition Concentrating on His Portraits". The Art News, 37. March 25, 1939..
Frankfurter, Alfred. "Dark Horse in Williamstown." Art News 54, no. 4 (Summer 1955): 28–31.
Elda Fezzi.. L'opera complete di Renoir, nel periodo impressionista 1869-1883.. Milan: Rizzoli.. 1972..
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1970.
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1972.
Elizabeth Ryan Gurley.. "Renoir a beaucoup puisé chez Manet.". Connaissance des Arts.. May 1973.:pp. 132-39..
Elizabeth Ryan Gurley.. "Of Roses and Renoir and a Marble Statuette.". Die Kunst und das schöne Heim.. March 1974..
. Encyclopedie du Tobac et des Fumeurs.. Editions du Temps.. 1975.
Martha Carey.. Pierre-Auguste Renoir: The Luncheon of the Boating Party.. Washington: Phillips Collection.. 1981..
Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984.
Melissa McQuillan.. Impressionist Portraits.. London: Thames & Hudson.. 1987..
Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992.
Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada. Renoir's Portraits: Impressions of an Age. June 27-Sept. 14, 1997; Art Institute of Chicago, Oct. 17, 1997-Jan. 4, 1998; Kimbell Art Museum, Feb. 8-April 26, 1998. (Exh. cat. by Colin Bailey et al.). National Gallery of Canada and Yale University Press, London..
Ilene Barth.. The Smoking Life.. Columbus (MS): The Genesis Press.. 1997..
François Daulte.. Auguste Renoir, Catalogue Raisonné de l'Oeuvre Peint.. Paris: Durand-Ruel.. 1971..
Lees, Sarah, ed. Nineteenth-Century European Paintings at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven and London: distributed by Yale University Press, 2012.
Ganz, James A. and Richard R. Brettell. Great French Paintings from the Clark: Barbizon through Impressionism. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Skira Rizzoli Publications; Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 2011.
Paris: Galeries Durand-Ruel.. Portraits par Renoir.. June 5-20, 1912..
EUROPEAN PAINTINGS CATALOGUE ENTRY
Provenance
Alphonse Fournaise, the sitter, Chatou (d. 1905); [Gaston-Alexandre Camentron, Paris, in 1905, sold to Durand-Ruel, Paris, 4 Dec. 1905]; [Durand-Ruel, Paris, from 1905]; [Durand-Ruel, New York, probably by 1934, sold to Clark, 26 June 1939]; Robert Sterling Clark (1939–55); Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1955.
