The Skiff (La Yole)
An orange skiff crosses the lower half of the canvas on blue water, with two women aboard and a railway bridge behind. Pierre-Auguste Renoir built the picture out of bright unmixed paint, using no black and no earth colours at all. The National Gallery in London bought it in 1982 and numbers it NG6478.
- 1875
- Oil on canvas
About Pierre-Auguste Renoir
What the painting shows
A skiff painted in orange and gold runs almost the full width of the canvas, low down, with its reflection breaking up on the water beneath it. Two women sit in it. The nearer one wears a pale dress and a straw hat with a dark trim, her hair hanging in a long tail down her back, and she works an oar that runs down to the right into the water.
The second woman sits facing her, bareheaded, in pink and cream, her blonde hair pinned up. Neither has drawn features. Renoir gives each face a patch of pink and leaves it there.
Beyond them the far bank carries a pale villa with a slate roof and green shutters, a white fence, and small dark figures on the grass. A sailboat with a white triangular sail and a red-orange hull sits to the left, with a low green boat beside it. A clump of green reeds rises out of the water in the lower left corner, and Renoir signed the canvas beside them.
Where it was painted
The National Gallery places the scene on the Seine near Chatou, about ten miles west of central Paris, while noting that the exact site has not been identified. Chatou was a popular stretch for recreational boating.
The museum suggests Renoir was more interested in a generalised summer's day on the river than in an accurate topographical record. The same stretch of water supplied the balcony of the Maison Fournaise, where he later painted Luncheon of the Boating Party.
A railway bridge crosses the right side of the canvas, its dark span carrying a run of diagonal cross-bracing over a stone pier. Above the trees at the top, a line of thick white dabs marks the steam of a train arriving from Paris. A small white globe on a slender post stands at the near end of the bridge.
A date the museum revised
The painting is routinely dated 1879–80. The National Gallery states that it was probably executed in 1875, and gives 1875 as its own date for the work.
The museum's reasoning rests on handling. The soft feathery brushstrokes match Luncheon at La Fournaise, now at the Art Institute of Chicago, which Renoir painted in 1875.
The five-year difference matters for where the picture sits in his career. On the museum's dating it belongs to the same moment as Bal du moulin de la Galette, not to the turn of the 1880s.
Seven colours and no black
Renoir primed most of the canvas roughly with white paint to keep the tone light throughout. The National Gallery notes that the original pale brown canvas is still clearly visible around the edges.
He then limited himself to lead white and seven other strong colours, many of them pigments that had only recently come on the market. He used no black and no earth tones anywhere in the picture. The bright passages are unmixed paint taken straight from the tube.
The orange of the boat is set directly against the blue of the water. Under the colour theory published in 1839 by the French chemist Michel Eugène Chevreul, blue and orange are complementary, and each becomes more intense placed beside the other. The sailboat's hull repeats the same red-orange further back.
Despite the look of spontaneity, the National Gallery records that the picture evolved through distinct stages. The strokes are separate and legible in the foreground and middle distance, and soften for the trees behind. The distant treeline and the thin band of sky sit very close to the top edge, which pulls attention back to the surface of the canvas.
Beside Berthe Morisot
The National Gallery compares the picture with Summer's Day by Berthe Morisot, painted a few years later. Both show city dwellers at leisure on the water on the edge of Paris, and both push the far bank up towards the top of the canvas.
The motifs Renoir assembles are the standard furniture of Impressionist boating pictures: the skiff itself, a sailboat, a riverside villa and a railway bridge. The National Gallery reads the arriving train as a note on how easily the countryside could now be reached, and possibly as a nod to Claude Monet's interest in railways.
The woman at the oar sits almost dead centre, and the diagonal of the oar points at her. The museum treats her as the linchpin that holds the composition together, against a structure of horizontals in the boat and the bank.
From Victor Chocquet to Trafalgar Square
The first owner was Victor Chocquet, the customs official who collected Renoir and Paul Cézanne when almost nobody else did. The painting was sold at his death in 1899 to the dealers Bernheim-Jeune.
Samuel Courtauld bought it in 1929. The National Gallery purchased it by private treaty in 1982, through Thomas Gibson Fine Art Ltd, and records the acquisition simply as bought.
It hangs in the Sainsbury Wing. The museum's published account of the picture is drawn from its own annual report covering January 1982 to December 1984.
Close reading
Reading the work, detail by detail
Pierre-Auguste Renoir set an orange boat on blue water and used no black anywhere in the picture. Close views show how far he pushed unmixed colour, and how much of the river's traffic he packed into a narrow strip behind the skiff.
1.The woman at the oar sits almost dead centre
She is seen from behind and three-quarters, in a pale dress, with dark hair falling in a long tail down her back. Her straw hat carries a dark trim at the crown. Her hands sit low, and the oar runs from them down to the right into the water.
2.The second woman is bareheaded
The second woman faces her companion, bareheaded, her blonde hair pinned up. Her dress is pink over cream. Renoir gives her face a patch of pink and stops there, with no eyes, nose or mouth drawn in at all.
3.The hull is orange against blue
The hull runs almost the full width of the canvas in orange and gold, worked with long horizontal strokes. A darker orange-red line marks the gunwale. Against the deep blue of the water on both sides, the two colours drive each other harder.
4.The boat's reflection breaks up in the water
Below the hull the same orange returns as separate dashes over blue, with pink and cream among them. The reflection is never continuous. The strokes stay individually legible, so the water reads as moving rather than as a mirror.
5.A white sail over a red-orange hull
The sailboat carries a tall white triangular sail over a red-orange hull, and a small figure sits at the base of the mast. The hull repeats the colour of the skiff further forward. A low green boat lies beside it with a figure aboard.
6.The villa on the far bank
The villa has a slate-blue roof and a dark green shuttered window, with red and white vertical stripes beside it. White gateposts stand on the grass in front. Small dark marks along the bank stand in for people, with no features given.
7.The bridge span is a run of diagonals
The bridge span is dark blue-violet, crossed by diagonal bracing that reads as a continuous zigzag. It rests on a pale stone pier that widens towards the water. A parapet runs above the span, with trees crowding it on both sides.
8.The white dabs above the trees are steam
A line of thick white dabs runs above the dark treeline, and at the right end a small dark upright shape rises into it. These are not clouds. They are the steam of a train crossing behind the trees, and they sit lower than the sky around them.
9.A white globe on a thin post
A round white sphere sits on a slender dark post at the near end of the bridge. It is the brightest single mark in the upper half of the canvas and is painted as one loaded touch. Renoir leaves its function unexplained.
10.The water is a mesh of separate strokes
The surface is a dense mesh of short strokes: deep blue and violet, with white and yellow laid over them for the light. None of them is blended into its neighbour. Towards the background the same mesh tightens and the strokes shorten.
11.Reeds rise out of the water at the corner
A clump of upright green and blue-green strokes stands out of the water in the lower left corner. The strokes are drawn in one direction, against the flatter horizontal marks of the river. The orange reflection of the hull runs across just above them.
12.The signature, and the canvas showing through
The signature reads Renoir, brushed in dark blue at the lower left over the reeds. Around it the paint is thin enough that the weave of the canvas shows through in a regular grid. The museum notes that the pale brown canvas is visible around the edges.
Timeline
1875
Painted, on the National Gallery's dating, in the same year as Luncheon at La Fournaise and with the same soft feathery handling.
1899
Sold at the death of its first owner, Victor Chocquet, to the dealers Bernheim-Jeune.
1929
Bought by Samuel Courtauld.
1982
Purchased by the National Gallery by private treaty through Thomas Gibson Fine Art Ltd. Now NG6478.
2008–2010
Lent to the Van Gogh Museum on long loan from 18 November 2008.
2013
Shown at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Rouen for Normandie Impressionniste, from 27 April.
Where to see it
The National Gallery, London
Trafalgar Square, London WC2N 5DN, United Kingdom
Displays and loans can change. Check whether this work is on view before making a special trip.
Plan your visit on the museum’s official website (opens in a new tab)Frequently asked questions
Where is Renoir's The Skiff?
The National Gallery in London, inventory number NG6478, hanging in the Sainsbury Wing. The museum's full title for it is The Skiff (La Yole).
When did Renoir paint The Skiff?
The National Gallery dates it 1875. The picture is routinely dated 1879–80 elsewhere, but the museum states it was probably executed in 1875, on the evidence of brushwork that matches Luncheon at La Fournaise of that year.
Where is the river in The Skiff?
Probably the Seine near Chatou, about ten miles west of central Paris and a popular spot for recreational boating. The National Gallery says the exact site has not been identified.
Why is the boat orange?
Orange and blue are complementary colours under the theory Michel Eugène Chevreul published in 1839, and each looks more intense beside the other. Renoir set the orange skiff against blue water deliberately, and repeated the red-orange in the sailboat's hull.
Did Renoir use black in The Skiff?
No. The National Gallery records that he used lead white and seven other strong colours, avoiding black and earth tones entirely, with much of the paint applied unmixed straight from the tube.
Who owned The Skiff first?
Victor Chocquet, the collector who backed Renoir and Paul Cézanne early. After his death in 1899 it went to Bernheim-Jeune, then to Samuel Courtauld in 1929, and to the National Gallery in 1982.
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References
The sources below include collection records, catalogues, scholarly research, and primary materials that informed this page. They document The Skiff (La Yole), its making, and its place in cultural history.
1The Skiff (La Yole): public-domain reproduction
WebsiteWikimedia CommonsUsed forThe reproduction is the primary visual source for the close-reading details; rights metadata is preserved separately.
2Pierre-Auguste Renoir, The Skiff (La Yole) — collection record and in-depth text
WebsiteThe National Gallery, LondonUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the The Skiff (La Yole) page.
View source3Luncheon of the Boating Party — The Phillips Collection
WebsiteThe Phillips CollectionUsed forThe later Chatou picture painted on the same stretch of the Seine.
4Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) — The Metropolitan Museum of Art
WebsiteThe Metropolitan Museum of ArtUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the The Skiff (La Yole) page.
These references provide the documented foundation for this work's history and interpretation. Claim-level citations remain attached to the specific claims they support.
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