Renoir’s Dancer

One of the French Impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s favorite models was Suzanne Valadon, a working-class teen raised in the Montmartre district of Paris. In his paintings, she’s always softly pretty, vibrant, approachable. Aside from her physical appeal, Valadon was herself a talented artist. Her first serious self-portrait couldn’t have been more different from Renoir’s depiction:…