Nude

c. 1901

William Merritt Chase

Painter, American, 1849 - 1916

William Merritt Chase

Attributed to

Shown from the hips up, a mostly nude woman sits facing away from us with a white cloth wrapped around her hips in this vertical painting. The woman’s torso and head, which bends forward and to the right, are painted in detail, while the tan background and pumpkin-orange slashes below the white cloth are looser. The back of the woman’s ear and her elbows are tinged pink, and her black hair is pulled up. A hank of hair falls alongside her face. She reaches slightly forward with her right hand and holds something, though details beyond her body are difficult to make out. The painted area of the composition creates a loose oval in the center of the taupe-colored canvas. The artist signed the lower right corner, “Chase.”

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

  • Dimensions

    overall: 50.6 x 41 cm (19 15/16 x 16 1/8 in.)
    framed: 61.6 x 51.3 x 4.4 cm (24 1/4 x 20 3/16 x 1 3/4 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1995.47.1

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Content Johnson [d. 1949], New York, about 1901; Mrs. J.A. Bennet, New York, by 1948; by inheritance to her granddaughter [name unknown], until 1980; (Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York); private collection, 1983-1984; sold March 1984 to Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, Upperville, Virginia; gift 1995 to NGA.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1917

  • Loan Exhibition of Paintings by William M. Chase, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1917, no. 11.

1928

  • Exhibition of the Works of William Merritt Chase, American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York, 1928, no. 6.

1948

  • William M. Chase 1849-1916. A Selected Retrospective Exhibition of Paintings, American British Art Center, New York, 1948, no. 23, as The Red Shawl.

1984

  • The Art of Collecting, Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York, 1984, no. 33, repro., as Seated Nude from the Rear.

2007

  • Loan to display with permanent collection, Academy Art Museum, Easton, Maryland, 2007-2008.

Bibliography

1949

  • Peat, Wilbur D. "Checklist of Known Work by William M. Chase." In Chase Centennial Exhibition. Exh. cat. John Herron Art Institute, 1949: unpaginated, as The Red Shawl (Nude).

1996

  • Kelly, Franklin, with Nicolai Cikovsky, Jr., Deborah Chotner, and John Davis. American Paintings of the Nineteenth Century, Part I. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1996: 60, color repro. 61.

Inscriptions

lower right: Chase.

Wikidata ID

Q20190793

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