Two Figures on a Path (Deux figures dans un sentier)

Two Figures on a Path, 1906, belongs to Renoir's late outdoor figure compositions painted at and around Cagnes in the south of France. The path as compositional element—leading the eye into a sun-dappled landscape—had been an Impressionist device since Monet's 1870s garden and road paintings, and Renoir employed it throughout his career. In his late southern period, the figures on paths are typically women or children moving through warm, richly vegetated landscapes, combining his figure and landscape interests without the more elaborate compositional demands of his major canvases.

The path provides a pale diagonal element against the rich greens of the vegetation. Renoir paints the landscape with broadly applied warm greens and ochres, while the two figures are noted with somewhat more deliberate modelling of their silhouettes and clothing against the sunlit background.