Gabrielle et Jean

Renoir painted this at home around 1895. The young woman is Gabrielle Renard, a country cousin of the painter's wife who had come to Montmartre at 16 to help with the new baby and stayed on for years as the family's nanny and one of Renoir's favourite models. The child playing beside her is Renoir's second son Jean, not yet two, so restless that Renoir filled sheet after sheet with quick sketches trying to pin the pose down. They lean over a small toy on the table, absorbed in it together. That squirming toddler grew up to be Jean Renoir, one of the great film directors, who carried something of his father's warm, unhurried world onto the screen. Gabrielle stayed close to him for the rest of her life.