c. 1900／Oil on canvas
56.0 x 46.0 cm
Permanent Exhibition: From the Renaissance to the 20th Century – 500 Years of Western Paintings
Exhibition period：Saturday April 12～Sunday June 22, 2025
Permanent Exhibition Gallery 5 in the New Wingof Tokyo Fuji Art Museum
Permanent Exhibition: From the Renaissance to the 20th Century – 500 Years of Western Paintings
Exhibition period: Saturday July 12～Monday September 15, 2025
Permanent Exhibition Gallery 5 in the New Wing of Tokyo Fuji Art Museum
SUMMARY
Renoir often portrayed a woman who is reading a book. Among those paintings, the most famous one is Girl Reading (1874) in the collection of the Musée d’Orsay, which depicts that Margot, a young girl with chubby cheeks, is absorbed in reading a book in the reflected light. Here, the artist’s interest is the girl’s face shone in the bright sunlight, dazzlingly highlighting from the front her skin which seems to absorb the light. On the other hand, this Reading Woman captures a woman seen at an angle from behind, with her face hidden from view. The model’s name is also unknown. The woman sits barefoot on the sofa, with her white blouse thrown open and her left shoulder bared, but she is so absorbed in reading the book that she seems not to worry about others’ eyes at all. A woman baring her white-skinned shoulders is a recurring subject matter in Renoir’s work. The wall of the room is decorated with something like a large tapestry in which the image of what seems to be a half-naked woman can be seen. Renoir employed only pure hues such as red, white, yellow, green and blue, and painted the entire picture surface using a warm color scheme. The work gives viewers such an impression that the painter were entering and peeping into the personal time and space occupied by this woman, and is filled with an intimate atmosphere. As repeatedly painted by Manet, Morisot and other painters, the scene of a room where a figure is reading a book was a “new scene” and a “modern custom” in Paris of the time, and also one of the subject matters that the Impressionist figure painters were fond of painting.
ARTIST
Pierre-Auguste Renoir
1841-1919
List of artworks by the same artist
INFORMATION
Friday, July 28 - Sunday, August 27, 2023
Masterpieces of Modern Eastern and Western Painting Exhibition Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art (Ishikawa, Japan)
Saturday, January 12 - Saturday, May 4, 2019
500 Years of Western Paintings: Collection of Tokyo Fuji Art Museum Shanghai PowerLong Museum (Shanghai, China)
Tuesday, October 23 - Sunday, December 23, 2018
500 Years of Western Paintings: Collection of Tokyo Fuji Art Museum Tsinghua University Art Museum (Beijing, China)
Saturday, April 29 - Sunday, June 25, 2017
The Collection of the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum: East and West Encounters Niihama City Museum of Art (Ehime, Japan)
Saturday, January 14 - Sunday, April 16, 2017
IMAGE OF COLOR: Pierre-Auguste Renoir The Miyagi Museum of Art (Miyagi, Japan)
Saturday, September 17 - Sunday, November 6, 2016
Paintings GO Motion!: Kitayama Seitaro and Artists in the Taisho Era Tokyo Station Gallery (Tokyo, Japan)
Saturday, July 9 - Sunday, August 28, 2016
300 years of Western Painting from Baroque, Rococo to École de Paris Nagano Prefectural Shinano Art Museum (Nagano, Japan)
Saturday, January 9 - Sunday, February 7, 2016
UKIYOE JAPONISM: The Impressionist was fascinated by UKIYOE Hishikawa Moronobu Memorial Museum (Chiba, Japan)
Saturday, June 27 - Sunday, August 30, 2015
Feast of beauty: 300 years of Western Painting From Baroque, Rococo to Ecole de Paris Yawatahama Citizen Gallery (Ehime, Japan)
Wednesday, April 29 - Sunday, June 21, 2015
Feast of beauty: 300 years of Western Painting From Baroque, Rococo to Ecole de Paris The Tokushima Modern Art Museum (Tokushima, Japan)
Thursday, October 2 - Sunday, November 9, 2014
Inaugural Special Exhibition “All About Kanae Yamamoto” Ueda City Museum of Art (Nagano, Japan)
Saturday, May 25 - Sunday, September 8, 2013
Renoir and Painters of the Twentieth Century National Palace Museum (Taipei, Taiwan)
Saturday, April 17 - Sunday, June 27, 2010
Renoir: Tradition and Innovation The National Museum of Art, Osaka (Osaka, Japan)
Thursday, May 28 - Sunday, September 13, 2009
Renoir: Promise of Happiness Seoul Museum of Art (Seoul, South Korea)
Saturday, July 14 - Sunday, November 25, 2007
Impressionists and Its Sources: Monet, Renoir, and Barbizon Masters Musee d'art Mercian KARUIZAWA (Nagano, Japan)
Friday, April 18 - Sunday, May 25, 2003
The Great Masters of Art Fukuoka Art Museum (Fukuoka, Japan)
Thursday, January 2 - Sunday, January 26, 2003
Great Masters of Modern Japanese Oil Paintings Saga Prefectural Art Museum (Saga, Japan)
Saturday, October 5 - Monday, November 4, 2002
Art of the West & Art of Japan Exhibition: Monet, Renoir, Cezanne… Ikeno Taiga, Tani Buncho, and Others Shimane Art Museum (Shimane, Japan)
Saturday, September 7 - Sunday, September 29, 2002
Four Centuries of Occidental Paintings from the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum Collection SOGO Museum of Art (Kanagawa, Japan)
Saturday, July 20 - Sunday, September 1, 2002
The Great Masters of Art Hida Takayama Museum of Art (Gifu, Japan)
Sunday, October 1 - Sunday, December 3, 2000
Masterpieces of Western Paintings from the Renaissance to the 20th Century National Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall (Taipei, Taiwan)
Saturday, April 3 - Sunday, May 16, 1999
Renoir: Modern Eyes Kawamura Memorial DIC Museum of Art (Chiba, Japan)
Friday, September 4 - Friday, December 11, 1998
Wege des Impressionismus: Normandie – Paris 1860-1910 Landesmuseum Joanneum (Graz, Austria)
Provenance: Ambroise Vollard, Paris Galerie Thannhanser, Berlin-Luzern
Literature : Ambroise Vollard ; Tableaux, Pastel & Dessin de Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Tome 1 François Dalute; Catalogue raisonné de l’œuvre peint de Renoir, Tome 2, Figures 1891-1905, [En préparation]
EXPLORE
You can search and browse content on a platform across museums and archival institutions nationwide, and create My Gallery (online exhibition).
You can view the work in High-resolution.
The Official Navigator of the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum is voice-over artist, actress and vocalist Yoko Honna. She narrates the Japanese-language presentation and audio guidance segments of the works of Western paintings on display at our New Wing Permanent Gallery.
