National Gallery London to Host Major Renoir Exhibition in 2026

The National Gallery in London will present 'Renoir and Love', a monumental exhibition featuring over fifty works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, from October 3, 2026 to January 31, 2027. It will be the largest Renoir retrospective in the UK in twenty years and marks his return to the gallery after a long absence since 2007. The show is curated in collaboration with the Musée d'Orsay in Paris and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, focusing on Renoir's depiction of everyday, intimate, and playful love rather than idealized romance. Highlights include 'Bal au Moulin de la Galette' (1876) from the Musée d'Orsay, exhibited in the UK for the first time. The exhibition covers Renoir's work from the 1860s to the 1880s, featuring loans from private collections and international institutions such as the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen, the Städel Museum in Frankfurt, the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the Norton Simon Art Foundation in Pasadena, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Co-curator Christopher Riopelle, Neil Westreich Curator of Post-1800 Painting at the National Gallery, notes that Renoir captured love and friendship as transient as sunlight. The exhibition will debut at the Musée d'Orsay from March to July 2026, then travel to London, and conclude in Boston in spring 2027.