Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted this florid allegorical canvas, La fête de Pan, in the summer of 1879.
Commissioned to adorn the drawing room of the Bérard family’s country home, the Château de Wargemont, La fête de Pan depicts a spring festival devoted to the ancient Greek god, Pan - a rare example of a mythological subject in Renoir’s oeuvre.
This jubilant painting combines the artist’s careful observations of nature en plein air with his imaginative fantasies of beauty, both feminine and floral.