Madame Georges Charpentier and her children

In this commissioned portrait, as Marcel Proust observed, Renoir gave expression to "the poetry of an elegant home and the beautiful dresses of our time." In the Japanese-style sitting room of her Parisian townhouse—the décor and chic gown proof of her stylish taste—Marguerite Charpentier sits beside her son, Paul. At age three, his locks are still uncut and consistent with the current fashion; he is dressed identically to his sister Georgette who is perched on the family dog. The well-connected publisher's wife hosted elite literary salons attended by writers such as Flaubert, the Goncourts, and Zola and used her influence to ensure that the painting was placed in a good spot at the Salon of 1879.