Pierre-Auguste Renoir

December 3, 1919
Today is the anniversary of the death of the impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
Pierre-Auguste Renoir said, when he was painting flowers, he was able to paint,

“freely and boldly without the mental effort, he made with a model.”

He also said,

“If you paint the leaf on a tree without using a model,
your imagination will only supply you with a few leaves…
But nature offers you millions, all on the same tree. …
The artist who paints only what is in his mind must very soon repeat himself.”

It was Renoir who said,

“What seems most significant to me about [Impressionism]
is that we have freed painting
from the importance of the subject.
I am at liberty to paint flowers and call them flowers,
without their needing to tell a story.”

And speaking of stories, there's a little-known story about Renoir. For many years, he hung a sign on his garden gate which read,

"No Renoirs sold here. Beware the dog."