MASP

By Luciano Migliaccio
Inspired by Titian and Rubens, Renoir painted a series of female nudes in Cagnes-sur-Mer, in southern France (Adriani, 1996, p. 298). According to Camesasca (1989, p. 172), the model of Seated Bather Drying Her Righ Arm – Large Sitting Nude was Gabrielle Renard, cousin of the painter’s wife, who worked as governess for the family from 1894 when she was fifteen years old, until her marriage in 1915. She was Renoir’s favorite model during this period; however, the artist’s nudes are stylized by their very nature and, therefore, cannot be said to represent a specific person. The references to the opulent anatomy and to the chromatic splendor of Rubens and Titian stress this wish to stylize reality (Lucie-Smith 1984, p. 14), and bring him close, in this aspect, to Gauguin’s nudes (Camesasca). The volume of the figure and the background foliage establish a dialogue of pure forms and colors, far removed from the tradition of naturalism. Circa 1918 in a testimony given to Gimpel (1963, pp. 44-45), Renoir states: “In my paintings the landscape is only an accessory, and I try to combine it with the figure.” Indeed, he combines visual data from different angles and creates distortions that remind us of the figurative conventions of ancient Egyptian art and of Cézanne, thus anticipating some of the features that characterized the art of the twenties, when several avant-garde artists showed great interest in these late works, particularly Picasso, as seen in his nudes painted in 1920-1921. The treatment of the surfaces and the technique of the strokes bring to mind the last period of Delacroix, as well as the influence of Diaz and Monticelli, due to the overlapping touches of pure color in undulating rhythms.

— Luciano Migliaccio, 1998