Julie Manet

Julie Manet — daughter of Berthe Morisot and niece of Édouard Manet — was painted by Renoir in 1887, as part of the close friendship between Renoir and the Manet family that developed after Édouard Manet's death in 1883. Renoir became a guardian figure to Julie, and his portraits of her document the relationship across her childhood and adolescence. Julie Manet later published a remarkable memoir of her childhood in the Impressionist circle, and Renoir's portraits of her — including a famous image with a cat — are among the most historically resonant family portraits of the movement.

Renoir paints the young Julie with the careful attention of someone painting a known and beloved child, not an anonymous model. The face is more individually characterised than his generic female studies — sharper, more specific in feature. His warm, soft palette is deployed with particular tenderness here, the result being one of his most psychologically alert child portraits.