Alongside Edouard Vuillard, Pierre Bonnard became the leading painter of intimate interiors at the beginning of the 20th century. They had a mutual interest in the refined use of colour in the rooms. However, whereas Vuillard introduces psychology and dramatic tension, Bonnard remains strangely impersonal. His delicate execution of the two girls is akin to Renoir’s style.

But it is the lamp with its oversize orange coloured lampshade, and not the two girls that is the centre of the picture. At first it seems to be a foreign object, but it connects the two contrasting halves of the picture. In the light foreground an almost empty tablecloth has been spread across the table. The background in semi-darkness only reveals its wealth of details on closer inspection. It consists of panelling and wallpaper, a mirror on the wall and a chest of drawers. The soft warm tones of the lamplight playing across the yellow-white tablecloth, the girls dresses and into the depths of the room, connects the elements.

The painter’s visual perception of this work was not static. And it appears that his eyes wandered from the table up to the figures in the background. His moving perspective takes us with it.

And in this he enables us to immerse ourselves in the room with him and makes us aware of the difference between this and a normal view of reality.