Cat. 22. Grove of Trees, 1888/90

Cat. 22  Grove of Trees, 1888/90

Cat. 22

Grove of Trees
1888/90
Opaque and transparent watercolor, on cream wove paper;
 246 × 179 mm
The Art Institute of Chicago, bequest of William McCormick Blair, 1982.1827

From the late 1880s onward, as Renoir overcame his creative crisis of 1883–85, he created many studies in the manner of the present sheet. A rendition of a similar motif is evident in his Landscape with a Path between Trees (fig. 22.1), which shares the same flickering brushwork, although neither seems to have led directly into a more developed composition.

Characterized by a heightened palette and a subtle overlaying of washes, Grove of Trees shows Renoir’s ability to work with concentrated and dilute shades alike. While the foreground is described in the softest of hues, to add definition to the tree trunks, he reiterated the contours with opaque medium. These thin strokes, which reveal the use of a fine brush, extend into the forest canopy. There, they intermingle with bright greens and yellows; small dashes of broken color indicate leaves, while the brilliance of the smooth cream paper adds an occasional highlight. The watercolor gives an overall impression of spontaneity; small holes at the corners of the sheet suggest that Renoir might have pinned it to a board in order to work directly from nature. It seems as if he drew in paint; close observation reveals no sign of graphite underdrawing (see Technical Report). A comparable handling of media is on view in his Landscape, thought to be from the same period (fig. 22.2).1

The choice of rich oranges and browns in the Art Institute’s sheet might indicate the influence of fellow artist and friend Paul Cézanne. Renoir’s attitude to landscape seemed to change in the early 1880s; he visited Cézanne in Aix-en-Provence in 1882 and made paintings that were indebted to the artist’s visions of the area (e.g., fig. 22.3 [Dauberville 774]).2 Renoir traveled extensively during this period, in France and to the Channel Islands off the coast of Normandy, but also to Italy and North Africa. As Colin Bailey has noted, the landscapes the artist made between 1881 and 1883 are distinct, in their audacious use of color, from much of his later work.3

This sheet seems to recall the energy of that moment. The artist headed south again in 1888, to see Cézanne once more, and painted at least three canvases depicting Montagne Sainte-Victoire during his stay.4 It is clear that Renoir’s admiration for his friend was enduring; far later, French Symbolist Maurice Denis recalled that the artist had collected works by Cézanne and had helped him to secure patronage.5 If the location of the grove depicted here is unknown, the palette is distinctly Mediterranean.
Nancy Ireson

Technical Report

Technical Summary

Renoir created Grove of Trees directly in watercolor on a relatively smooth [glossary:wove] paper, utilizing most of the sheet. Infrared examination confirmed that there is no evidence of [glossary:underdrawing] or preliminary work (fig. 22.4). Rather, the artist worked directly from light to dark, layering a variety of opaque and transparent watercolors over one another, reserving the darkest purples and greens for final touches in the trees (fig. 22.5). Fine-tipped brushes were used to render the slender tree trunks with thin vertical lines and the delicate leaves with tiny dots. Some passages were blended to create recesses in the grove of trees. The composition was brought to completion with the addition of broad transparent washes to create grass in the foreground and place the grove in context along a hillside meadow.

Signature

Renoir (recto, lower right corner, in graphite) (fig. 22.6)

Media and Support

Support Characteristics

Primary paper type

Cream, moderately thick, smooth or slightly textured wove paper.6

Watermark

J. Whatman (near complete, vertical orientation, along right edge) (fig. 22.7).

Furnish

Uniform, without visible inclusions or colored fibers.

Formation

Even.

Other characteristics

The edges are all trimmed; the top edge is cut slightly irregularly. There are small pinholes in all four corners with faint graphite lines connecting the pinholes in some areas.

Dimensions

246 × 179 mm.

Preparatory Layers

There is a transparent white [glossary:wash] underlying the composition in the center of the [glossary:support] that fluoresces a yellowish-green visible light when exposed to ultraviolet ([glossary:UV]) radiation. There may also be a faint pinkish-white coating overall on the sheet that extends to the edges of the support.

Under UV illumination, there is a light yellow visible-light [glossary:fluorescence] overall on the paper surface that is characteristic of a light gelatin surface [glossary:sizing].

Media Characteristics

The composition was drawn with brush and opaque and transparent watercolor. Fine brushstrokes of opaque watercolor (gouache) were first applied layered upon one another to form the dense grove of trees. This direct additive process involved little blending, except in the foreground of the composition. Broad washes of transparent watercolor were added at the left edge and in the foreground to form the grassy hillside.

In the center of the image, there is a circular area of brush-applied translucent white medium that reemits a bright yellow-green visible light under UV illumination.

There is no drawing on the verso.

Compositional Development

No revisions or changes are visible in the composition in normal conditions or under magnification (fig. 22.4).

Surface Treatment

No artistic surface fixatives or coatings are visible in normal conditions or under magnification. There is a light yellow visible-light fluorescence under UV illumination that suggests the presence of a light gelatin surface sizing.

Condition History

The drawing is in very good condition overall. There is light surface soiling and discoloration overall; smudges from handling are evident at the upper and lower right edge. Light discoloration is visible overall, except along the very edges of the paper where it was likely protected from light exposure by a former window mat. The paper support was formerly edge mounted to a secondary support. Brown paper remnants and residual adhesive are visible along the perimeter on the verso. There are small absences or voids of watercolor medium within thickly applied passages; magnification reveals that these areas are not losses, but rather places where the media did not adhere to the underlying support when applied.
Kimberly Nichols

Provenance

Jacques Rosenthal (1854–1937), Munich.7

Sold by Richard Zinser, Forest Hills, Long Island, New York, to William McCormick Blair (1884–1982), Chicago, Oct. 1969.8

Bequeathed by William McCormick Blair to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1982.

Selected References

Douglas W. Druick, Renoir, Artists in Focus (Art Institute of Chicago/Abrams, 1997), p. 68, no. 20 (ill.).

Other Documentation

Examination Conditions and Technical Analysis

Raking Visible Light

Paper support characteristics identified.

Transmitted Visible Light

Paper mold characteristics identified.

Transmitted Infrared (Fuji, 1.0–1.1 µm)

Watermark captured.

Ultraviolet-Induced Visible Fluorescence (365 nm)

Bright yellow-green fluorescence observed in translucent white medium.

Infrared Reflectography (Fujifilm S5 Pro with X-Nite 1000B/2 mm filter [1.0–1.1 µm])

No underdrawing detected.

Stereomicroscopy (80–100×)

Media type/application identified.

Image Inventory

The image inventory compiles records of all known images of the artwork on file in the Imaging Department and in the conservation and curatorial files in the Department of Prints and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago (fig. 22.8).

REMOVED PENDING CONFIRMATION The watercolor relates compositionally and technically to Renoir’s Mixed Flowers in an Earthenware Pot (Dauberville 23), a painting in oil on paperboard, mounted on canvas (c. 1869; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston). Dauberville refers to the Renoir catalogue raisonné: Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vols. 1–5 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2007–14).

Paper description of thickness and texture follow the standard set forth in Elizabeth Lunning and Roy Perkinson, The Print Council of America Paper Sample Book: A Practical Guide to the Description of Paper (Print Council of America/Sun Hill, 1996).

DELETED Grove of Trees corresponds to XXX -- cat rais (not used).

DELETED Daulte and Dauberville refer to the Renoir catalogues raisonnés: François Daulte, Auguste Renoir: Catalogue raisonné de l’oeuvre peint (Durand-Ruel, 1971); Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vols. 1–5 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2007–14). Landscape with a Path between Trees corresponds to XXXXX.

François Daulte suggested the date of 1886 for this sheet. See Colin B. Bailey, “Landscape with Trees,” in Masterpieces of Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, The Annenberg Collection, Colin B. Bailey, Joseph J. Rishel, and Mark Rosenthal, exh. cat. (Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1989), p. 39. 

Christopher Riopelle, “Rocks at L’Estaque, 1882,” and “Renoir’s Landscapes, 1862–1883,” in Renoir Landscapes, 1865–1883, ed. Colin B. Bailey and Christopher Riopelle, exh. cat. (National Gallery, London, 2007), pp. 252–53. Dauberville refers to the Renoir catalogue raisonné: Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vols. 1–5 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2007–14).

Colin B. Bailey, “‘The Greatest Luminosity, Colour and Harmony’: Renoir’s Landscapes, 1862–1883,” in Renoir Landscapes, 1865–1883, ed. Colin B. Bailey and Christopher Riopelle, exh. cat. (National Gallery, London, 2007), pp. 51–52.

On the painting, see John House, “Montagne Sainte-Victoire (no. 82),” in Renoir, ed. Michael Raeburn, exh. cat. (Arts Council of Great Britain, 1985), pp. 82–83.

Maurice Denis, “Renoir,” La vie, Feb. 1, 1920, cited in Renoir: Ecrits, entretiens et lettres sur l’art, ed. Augustin de Butler (Éd. de l’Amateur, 2002), p. 175.

According to Richard Zinser, “It came in former days from Jacques Rosenthal Munich with the title ‘lisière de foret.’” Richard Zinser to Harold Joachim, Oct. 9, 1969, in curatorial object file, Art Institute of Chicago.

Richard Zinser to Harold Joachim, Oct. 9, 1969, in curatorial object file, Art Institute of Chicago.