Mont Sainte-Victoire, c.1889 by Pierre-Auguste Renoir

Mont Sainte-Victoire, painted by Pierre-Auguste Renoir around 1889, lifts the eye toward the pale limestone ridge rising above the rolling Provencal countryside, with two figures gathering wood among silvery olive trees in the foreground and a distant farmhouse tucked into the valley. The brushwork is broken and directional, the palette built on warm ochres, soft greens, and the chalky lavender-blues of the mountain's distinctive stone under a sky full of drifting clouds. Renoir painted this view of Sainte-Victoire, the limestone ridge east of Aix-en-Provence, during a visit to Provence; the mountain is far better known today as Paul Cezanne's signature subject, but Renoir treated the same motif in his own warmer, more colorful Impressionist manner. The picture distills the clear southern light and a single famous silhouette into a luminous Impressionist landscape.

Artist: Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841-1919). Date: c.1889.

Mont Sainte-Victoire, c.1889 by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. Impressionist Provence Canvas Print.