PIERRE-AUGUSTE RENOIR (1841-1919) Vase de fleurs des champs signed 'Renoir' (lower left) oil on canvas 14 15/16 x 11 13/16 in (38 x 30 cm) Painted circa 1887 Footnotes: This work will be included in the second supplement to the Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles de Renoir, currently being prepared by Guy-Patrice and Floriane Dauberville. Provenance Gabrielle Renard-Slade Collection, Cagnes & Los Angeles (a gift from the artist). John Slade Collection, Beverly Hills (by descent from the above circa 1959). Thence by descent to the present owner. Exhibited Los Angeles, Dalzell Hatfield Galleries, Renoir, 1841-1919, September 15 - October 15, 1943, no. 33 (titled 'Wild Flowers'). Literature The Wildenstein Plattner Institute, Inc. (eds.), Pierre-Auguste Renoir: Catalogue Raisonné Project, online catalogue, no. PR1778 (illustrated). 'Madame Renoir always kept flowers in the house, arranged in those inexpensive, pretty green vases that caught Renoir's fancy in the shop windows' (Ambroise Vollard quoted in M. Hoog, Catalogue of the Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume Collection, Paris, 1987, p. 208). Pierre-Auguste Renoir's floral still lifes occupy a distinctive place within his oeuvre, revealing an artist deeply invested in color, tactility, and the sensory immediacy of paint. Although he is best known for his figure paintings and scenes of modern life, Renoir repeatedly returned to bouquets as a subject that allowed him to explore chromatic invention and painterly freedom under controlled conditions. These works are not peripheral experiments, but sustained investigations into how color, light, and brushwork can generate pictorial unity without reliance on narrative or academic structure. Today, they represent one of his most sought-after and desired motifs. Renoir himself emphasized the restorative and exploratory nature of painting flowers. He explained his method of working to Albert André, 'I just let my brain rest when I paint flowers...I establish the tones, I study the values carefully, without worrying about losing the picture' (Renoir quoted in W. Gaunt, Renoir, Oxford, 1982, p. 32). This idea of 'resting the brain' suggests not passivity, but rather a shift in cognitive focus: from analytical construction to direct engagement with sensation. In a similar vein, he described floral painting as a space of experimentation, stating, 'Painting flowers is a form of mental relaxation...When I am painting flowers I can experiment boldly with tones and values without worrying about destroying the whole painting' (Renoir quoted in G. Rivière, Renoir et ses amis, Paris, 1921, p.81). Together, these remarks frame the floral still life as a privileged arena for chromatic risk-taking and technical fluidity. At the same time, Renoir's approach was not purely spontaneous. He also described a careful, almost analytical process of arranging his subject: 'When I have arranged a bouquet in order to paint it, I look at it from every angle and remain standing at the side I had not thought of' (Renoir quoted in G. Adriani, Renoir, exh. cat., Kunsthalle Tubingen, Cologne, 1999, p. 274). This insistence on shifting viewpoints reveals the compositional intelligence underlying the apparent immediacy of his floral paintings. The bouquet is not simply observed but actively constructed through sustained looking, repositioning, and selection. The floral still lifes of the 1880s, including works such as Vase de fleurs des champs, exemplify this productive tension between freedom and structure. This period marked a significant transition in Renoir's practice following his travels to Italy, after which he began to reassess the looseness of Impressionism in favor of greater solidity in form. Yet in his flower paintings, he retained the movement, luminosity, and optical vibrancy associated with his earlier work. In Vase de fleurs des champs, an emerald green vase anchors a profusion of wildflowers rendered in saturated reds, pinks, yellows, blues, and violets. The bouquet appears naturally abundant, but its visual coherence depends on careful modulation of tone and rhythm. Renoir's handling of paint is central to the effect. Individual petals are suggested through quick, loaded strokes that allow colors to blend optically rather than through strict contouring. The surface is animated but controlled, producing a shimmering density in which light seems to emerge from the pigment itself. The background, softly articulated through muted tonal shifts and directional brushwork, supports the bouquet without competing for attention, subtly reinforcing its chromatic vitality. Despite their apparent spontaneity, these compositions are highly orchestrated. Renoir structures the bouquet so that the viewer's eye moves fluidly across the canvas, guided by recurring color echoes and alternating warm and cool passages. Bright blossoms, such as pale daisies with golden centers, function as visual anchors that punctuate the composition and prevent visual dispersion. The green vase provides a stabilizing counterweight, grounding the arrangement while reflecting surrounding hues and integrating itself into the overall color harmony. The significance of these works becomes clearer when considered alongside Renoir's broader output. Floral motifs appear throughout his career, not only in independent still lifes but also embedded within portraits and landscapes. Their recurrence suggests that flowers functioned as a kind of experimental field for problems that extended across his practice: how to unify complex color relationships, how to balance surface richness with structural clarity, and how to render tactile sensation through paint. In this sense, the floral still lifes are closely connected to his figure painting of the same period. The softness of petals, the luminosity of chromatic transitions, and the sensuous handling of paint anticipate the treatment of skin, fabric, and background in his portraits. Rather than existing apart from his major works, the flower paintings can be understood as parallel investigations into the same pictorial concerns, distilled into a more concentrated and controllable format. Ultimately, Renoir's floral still lifes demonstrate his ability to transform a traditional genre into a site of sustained artistic inquiry. As his own statements make clear, flowers offered both relaxation and rigor: a subject that permitted experimentation while still demanding careful observation and compositional intelligence. In works such as Vase de fleurs des champs, this duality is resolved into a painting that is at once vibrant and structured, immediate and deliberate, an enduring expression of Renoir's commitment to color as both sensation and construction. This lot is subject to the following lot symbols: Seller of the lot has been guaranteed a minimum price for its property by Bonhams or by a third party, or jointly by Bonhams and a third party (called third party guarantor). Such guaranteed minimum price may apply only to the lot or on an aggregate basis to all or a portion of the seller's consigned property, which may be offered in one or more auctions. Bonhams and/or any third parties providing a guarantee may benefit financially if the guaranteed property is 9 sold successfully and may incur a financial loss if its sale is not successful. The third party guarantor typically provides an irrevocable written bid on the guaranteed lot prior to the auction at a level that ensures the lot will sell. 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