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A young woman shepherds a pair of identically dressed little sisters along the path of a well-maintained public park. All three figures are outfitted for the cold and in the height of fashion. The eldest wears a blue velvet jacket with wide sleeves trimmed with red fox; the little girls wear miniature blue-green jackets trimmed with either swansdown or white mink. Further up the pathway to the right, Renoir has included no fewer than eleven additional figures and two playful dogs. La Promenade was the centerpiece of the artist’s submission to the Second Impressionist Exhibition in the spring of 1876. To his dismay, most critics ignored this ambitious figure painting and those who commented on it did so unfavorably.
Source: Renoir, Impressionism, and Full-Length Painting. New York: The Frick Collection, 2012.
