New!  Collection Spotlight! This monthly news item highlights an object from the permanent collection with descriptive and interpretive information.

Pierre Auguste Renoir
The Hat Secured with a Pin (3rd version), 1894
Etching
Plate: 4 5/8 x 3 3/8 inches
Sheet: 13 1/8 x 8 9/16 inches
Accession #: 2012.002.1575
Gift of Emile H. Mathis II

Pierre Auguste Renoir’s The Hat Secured with a Pin (ca. 1894) displays the artist’s experimentation with printmaking, specifically his use of soft ground etching. The Hat, also known as Pinning the Hat, depicts artist Berthe Morisot’s daughter Julie from behind, pinning flowers to her cousin Paulette’s broad-brimmed hat. The softened lines are reminiscent of the spontaneity of drawing and create a blur that mirrored Impressionist brushwork. The Hat became Renoir’s most famous and sought-after etching due to its similarity with paintings of his final period.

Jackie Murphy, Fall 2015 UWM Art History Galleries Graduate Student Intern