Frau mit einem Brief

By 1890 Renoir had worked his way out of a crisis. Through the mid-1880s he had turned cooler and more linear, doubting the loose Impressionist touch that first made his name, and this painting shows where he came back to rest. The letter the young woman holds is really just a pretext. Renoir borrows the idea from Jean-Honoré Fragonard, the 18th-century painter of dreamy fantasy figures, reaching back past Impressionism to the older French tradition of Boucher and Fragonard he had admired as a boy decorating porcelain. The same model turns up in other canvases from these years, once holding a basket of oranges. This warm, softened handling stayed with him for the rest of his life.