3-070-621 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Her First Hand at an Oar - from the picture by M. Renouf, exhibited in the Paris Salon, 1881. 'This was one of the famous pictures at the Paris Salon in the late season: and it is through the courtesy of Messrs. Goupil, of Paris and London, that we are able to transfer it to our pages. Emile Renouf, its painter, burst upon the art-world last year with his "Fisherman's Widow," a picture which appealed with irresistible power to the tenderer feelings of those who looked upon it. The sentiment in M. Renouf's present work is not less touching, only the emotion awakened is that of hope and gladness. The air of innocence, the brightness of spirit, and the naive self-consciousness with which this little girl looks in our face, placing her tiny hands on the great oar, while her grandfather, pipe in cheek, with a smile of ineffable content playing over his countenance, looks down upon his little ocean-darling cannot fail to charm. It is one of the sweetest and frankest bits of child-portraiture and child-nature that we can remember to have ever seen. M. Renouf studied under Boulanger, J. Lefebvre, and Carolus-Curan; and this year he more than maintains the high position he commanded for himself by his "Fisherman's Widow," in the preceding exhibition'. From "Illustrated London News", 1881.