Ritratto di Albert Cahen d'Anvers

The young man lounging here with a cigarette was Albert Cahen d'Anvers, a composer who had studied under César Franck, one of the leading French musicians of the day. Renoir painted him in 1881 at a friend's house, catching him mid-pose, relaxed and a little pleased with himself. Male portraits of the period were usually sober and dark, but Renoir let this one stay light and decorative. The curl of the sitter's moustache picks up the curl of the wallpaper behind him, and his reddish hair rhymes with the feathery leaves of a potted plant at his side. Later that same year Renoir travelled to Italy, where the frescoes of Raphael would begin to pull his painting toward firmer, more classical lines.