Renoir's Birthday
Next: February 25, 2027
Paint the pleasures of life.
The story
Where it comes from
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was born in Limoges, France, on 25 February 1841, and this Story marks his birthday. The son of a tailor, he was apprenticed at 13 to a porcelain factory, painting bouquets on plates. In Paris he studied in the studio of Charles Gleyre, where he became friends with Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley and Frédéric Bazille. Together they painted outdoors and helped create Impressionism. His sunlit crowds, dances and family portraits, such as 'Luncheon of the Boating Party', are among the best-loved pictures in the world.
How it's celebrated
There is no formal observance, but museums from Paris to London and Washington hang his paintings all year, and many share them online. His birthday is a good day to visit a gallery, to sketch friends at a café table, or to send a card with a picture full of colour and light.
Did you know
- Renoir and his fellow Impressionists tried to paint light-filled pictures from which black was left out.
- He once told his teacher Gleyre that if painting were not a pleasure to him, he would certainly not do it.
- As a boy he painted flowers on porcelain plates, then fans and church hangings, before he could afford to study painting.
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