In 1912, Alfred C. Barnes, later of the Barnes Foundation, sent his friend William J. Glackens (1870–1938) to Paris to purchase the works of Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919). Subsequently, he had access to all of the new European modern art that Barnes' collection acquired including Paul Cézanne, Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso. Examining the similarities and differences in Glackens' late style and Renoir's work, how Glackens' style grew out of those early experiences with the avant-garde and shedding new light on the history of taste in American collecting from the late-19th to the mid-20th century, William J. Glackens and Pierre-Auguste Renoir: Affinities and Distinctions brings together over 30 works from these two artists for the first time in an art history book.