Wash-House Boat at Bas-Meudon Slider Image 1

Wash-House Boat at Bas-Meudon Slider Image 2

Invoice from Durand-Ruel, to Robert Sterling Clark, for the purchase of five paintings. Dated 4 October 1937.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir

French, 1841–1919

Wash-House Boat at Bas-Meudon

c. 1874

At the center of this painting is a lavoir, or wash-house boat, where France’s working classes could wash laundry. The vessel is positioned on a stretch of the River Seine in Meudon, a town famous as the site of one of Louis XIV’s palaces. Rather than emphasizing the town’s historic significance, Renoir focused on a scene from contemporary life and painted the water, trees, boats, and figures with uniformly thin brushstrokes, producing a quintessentially modern landscape.

Medium	oil on canvas
Dimensions	19 11/16 x 24 in. (50 x 61 cm) Frame: 27 x 31 x 4 3/8 in. (68.6 x 78.7 x 11.1 cm)
Object Number	1955.610
Acquisition	Acquired by Sterling and Francine Clark before 1955
Status	On View

Image Caption

Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Wash-House Boat at Bas-Meudon, c. 1874, oil on canvas. Clark Art Institute, 1955.610

Select Bibliography

Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute.. Exhibit Six: Impressionist Paintings.. Opened Sept. 18, 1956.. Art Exhibitions Australia.. Renoir: Master Impressionist. Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, July 30-Sept. 11, 1994; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Sept. 19-Oct. 30, 1994; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Nov, 6, 1994-Jan. 15, 1995. Cat. by John House. Kern, Steven, et al. A Passion for Renoir: Sterling and Francine Clark Collect, 19161951. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., in association with the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1996 Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1970. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1972. Elda Fezzi.. L'opera complete di Renoir, nel periodo impressionista 1869-1883.. Milan: Rizzoli.. 1972.. . Renoir. Great Masters of Modern Art. 9. Tokyo: Kodansha. 1979. Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1984. Kern, Steven, ed. List of Paintings in the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1992. Lees, Sarah, ed. Nineteenth-Century European Paintings at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute. Williamstown, MA: Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute; New Haven and London: distributed by Yale University Press, 2012.

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Provenance

[Possibly Durand-Ruel, Paris];¹ Anna Thompson (until 1909, sold to Durand-Ruel, New York, 17 Apr. 1909); [Durand-Ruel, New York, 1909–37, sold to Clark, 10 Apr. 1937]; Robert Sterling Clark (1937–55); Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, 1955. 1. Caroline Durand-Ruel Godfroy indicated that gallery records list a Durand-Ruel photo no. 88 of this painting. This suggests that the photograph is quite old, and it in turn implies that Durand-Ruel may have owned the painting at an early date, prior to its entering the Thompson collection. See correspondence dated 24 April 2001, in the Clark’s curatorial file. It is possible that this painting was deposited by the artist with Durand-Ruel on 8 Dec. 1888, deposit no. 6635, and purchased on 4 Oct. 1890, stock no. 659, titled La Seine à Bas Meudon, but information in the Durand-Ruel Archives, along with labels on the painting reverse, is inconclusive.