Grand nu

In the spring of 1907 Henri Matisse showed a reclining nude in Paris, a woman built from hard, angular strokes and shades of blue, and the public was shocked. That same year Renoir, in his mid-sixties, signed and dated this one. She stretches along nearly the whole canvas, 156 centimetres wide, lying on a white sheet against big patterned cushions with one hand raised to her hair. The Musée d'Orsay likens the pose to the odalisques of Ingres, the 19th-century master of the smooth reclining nude. It also notes that Renoir held back from bright colour, keeping to a narrow range of soft, warm tones. Matisse and Picasso would both go on to study these late nudes. This is probably the last of three versions painted between 1903 and 1907. Another hangs just across the Seine, at the Musée de l'Orangerie.