As we know from his comments on Skaters in the Bois de Boulogne,Renoirdid not like snow. John Rewald tells us that when a young artist showed him a winter scene in 1910,Renoirremarked: ‘White does not exist in nature. You admit that you have a sky above that snow. Your sky is blue. That blue must show up in the snow. In the morning there is green and yellow in the sky. These colours must also show up in the snow when you say that you painted your picture in the morning. Had you done it in the evening, red and yellow would have to appear in the snow.’

This snow scene is in a sense an application ofRenoir’s theory, but it is also a reminder that his friends Sisley, Monet and even Pissarro had a predilection for this kind of subject. In terms of style and technique, it is very similar to the landscapes Monet painted at Argenteuil in about 1875 and to The Seine at Champrosay, whichRenoirexhibited in 1876.