Seen from above on a bright day, the Pont Neuf in Paris swarms with people: women with parasols, men in top hats and children, while carriages and carts roll across the bridge. A French flag flies at the right over the blue Seine, an equestrian statue stands at the far end, pale apartment buildings line the far bank, and white clouds drift across a deep blue sky. Pierre-Auguste Renoir painted the oldest bridge in Paris in 1872. According to his younger brother Edmond, then a novice journalist, Renoir got the use of an upper floor of a café for the day while Edmond stopped passersby long enough to be sketched.

The National Gallery of Art cautions that the picture is more richly nuanced than the anecdote suggests and was likely preceded by careful preparation. Painted after the Franco-Prussian War and the civil strife of 1870–1871, it shows the city whole and busy again. Renoir signed it "A. Renoir.

72." and sold it at his own auction in Paris on March 24, 1875, to the dealer Durand-Ruel. After several private collections, Ailsa Mellon Bruce bought it in 1966, and it came to the National Gallery of Art with her bequest in 1970. It is in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.