“Renoir and Love” opens today at London’s National Gallery: over 22,000 tickets sold, a new record for the museum

The exhibition “Renoir and Love” opens today, 3 October 2026, at the National Gallery in London and will remain open until 31 January 2027. The Gallery has announced that the exhibition has broken the institution’s record for advance ticket sales: over 22,000 tickets were sold in six weeks, leaving behind the previous record of 15,654 tickets for the exhibition “Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers” (2024), as The Art Newspaper writes.

Tickets for the exhibition went on sale for gallery members on 4 August, while for the general public they became available on 25 August — and interest proved extraordinary from the first days.

The exhibition contains 45 works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, from the painter’s early career to the end of the 1880s, offering a complete panorama of one of Impressionism’s most beloved artists.

The curators admit that Renoir continues to divide critical opinion, but emphasise that his popularity with the public remains great — something best evidenced by the new advance sales record.

The exhibition is a collaboration of the National Gallery with the Musée d’Orsay in Paris and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. After closing in London, it will travel to Boston, where it will remain open from 20 February to 13 June 2027.