Provenance

Boussod et Valadon

French, est. 1884 - closed 1919

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See all 18 works of art
Alfred Stevens, Young Woman in White Holding a Bouquet, c. 1865/1875, oil on wood, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.65

Young Woman in White Holding a Bouquet

Alfred Stevens · c. 1865/1875 · oil on wood ·  Accession ID  1963.10.65

Shown from the knees up, a woman stands facing us as she turns her head to look off to our right in this vertical portrait painting. The woman has pale, peachy skin, deeply shadowed, hooded eyes, and a straight nose. Shadows fill the hollow of her high cheekbones, and she has a thin face. Her black hair is plaited and tied up and back under brown bands. Earrings hang from each ear, and she wears two strands of white and gray pearls and three red necklaces. Her shoulders slope down, and her arms hang by her sides. The garnet-red bodice of her dress is cut low over a white undergarment. Red straps loop up over her mostly bare shoulders. Sapphire-blue sleeves leave the shoulders exposed and have black bands at the cuffs, which fall short of her wrists. An apron tied around her waist is loosely painted with deep red flowers and dark green leaves against a parchment-brown background. Her long skirt is midnight blue in the shadows. She holds a shimmering object in her right hand, to our left, and rests her other hand on the brown stone wall that runs behind her thighs. A tree edges into the scene along the right, and a few white stucco houses with flat, red roofs cluster on a rocky hill in the distance behind the woman, to our left. The cliffs span most of the background and end in a sheer face near the right edge of the canvas. The sky is tinged with peach at the horizon glimpsed at the foot of the cliff but is mostly steely gray. The artist signed the lower left corner, “COROT.”
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Agostina, 1866, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.108

Agostina

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot · 1866 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1963.10.108

This painting shows a waterfront with boats and buildings in the distance. The shadowy horizon line divides the composition between the gray sky and gray water. The distant shore features faint outlines of buildings. Closer to us, boats are anchored with their masts tied up, creating lines against the sky. The sails and rigging are painted in earthy colors. At the bottom of the painting, shadowy shapes that may be the silhouettes of people appear to walk across a path or bridge. Most of the painting is in shades of gray, and the brushstrokes are soft and translucent, giving the painting a blurred quality.
James McNeill Whistler, Grey and Silver: Chelsea Wharf, c. 1864/1868, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.99

Grey and Silver: Chelsea Wharf

James McNeill Whistler · c. 1864/1868 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1942.9.99

The sculpture depicts a standing nude female figure with long golden hair cascading over her shoulders and down her back. Her arms are by her sides, and she stands upright, looking down and to the left. The material of the sculpture is dark, and her skin is a dark brown color. There are some small dots of gold on her torso and around her groin. The figure stands on a round base with an uneven surface.
Paul Gauguin, Eve, 1890, glazed ceramic, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1970.30.1

Eve

Paul Gauguin · 1890 · glazed ceramic ·  Accession ID  1970.30.1

A woman and the baby she holds float in a cloud flanked by two winged angels, as two women stand below in this tall, vertical painting. All the people have pale skin shaded with smoke gray, and their necks, fingers, and limbs are elongated. At the top center of the painting Mary holds Jesus on her lap. Jesus is nude except for a white cloth wrapped around his middle. His body faces us as he looks off to our left. He has blond, curly hair and the pudgy features of a baby. He grasps the forefinger of Mary’s right hand, to our left, and his other hand rests by his side. Mary looks down at the baby with her head tilted to our right. One hand reaches around Jesus’s torso and the other arm is lifted, so he can hold her finger. She wears a white veil draped over chestnut-brown hair and a sapphire-blue cloak over a voluminous, rose-pink dress. A winged angel looks on to each side of this pair. Both angels have blond hair and delicate features. The angel to our left wears a parakeet-green robe and has ice-blue wings. That angel crosses arms over the chest, as the angel to our right holds hands together in prayer. The second angel wears shell white and has silvery-gray wings. Both are seen from the chest up from behind puffy, pale blue clouds. Above the angels, rows of ghostly winged baby heads are loosely painted with tones of ivory white and slate gray. They frame a golden glow that surrounds Mary’s head. At Mary’s feet are five more winged baby heads. In the bottom third of the painting, two women stand with their bodies facing inward, toward each other. They both have honey-brown hair, snub noses, and pointed chins. The woman to our left looks up at Mary with large, glistening eyes, her pale pink lips parted. She wears a canary-yellow robe over a topaz-blue, long-sleeved garment. One hand curves over the head of a lion standing in front of her, holding one end of a long palm frond that rests on her right shoulder, closer to us. Two curling lines on the lion’s forehead are the cursive Greek letters for Delta and Theta, which are the artist’s initials. The woman to our right looks down so we see her in profile. A gossamer-white veil covers her hair and drapes across her chest. She is enveloped in a shimmering, flame-red cloak. A white lamb lies across the woman’s left forearm, closer to us, and the woman holds her other hand up to her chest.
El Greco, Madonna and Child with Saint Martina and Saint Agnes, 1597/1599, oil on canvas, wooden strip added at bottom, Widener Collection, 1942.9.26

Madonna and Child with Saint Martina and Saint Agnes

El Greco · 1597/1599 · oil on canvas, wooden strip added at bottom ·  Accession ID  1942.9.26

An armored man on horseback hands a piece of emerald-green cloth down to the nearly nude man standing next to him in this slightly stylized, vertical painting. Both men have light skin, and they, along with the horse, nearly fill the composition. To our right, the bright white horse stands angled to our right with the front left hoof raised. It has a smoke-gray mane, and wears a black bridle. The man riding the horse has short, copper-blond hair and a long face with a pointed chin. He looks down at the ground with dark eyes under black, arched brows. He has a long, thin nose, and his small lips are closed and framed by the faint suggestion of a mustache. He wears a white ruff pleated into figure-eights over his high-necked armor, which is liberally outlined and decorated with gold against the pewter-colored plates. He grips the voluminous, green cape in one hand and holds a sword in the other, down by the leg we can see. The cleanshaven man next to him, to our left, looks off to our right in profile. He has close-cropped, dark hair and smooth skin. His lips are parted, and he tips his head slightly away from us. He holds the green cloth with the hand closer to the horse and gestures down with his other pointer finger, in front of his hip. A white cloth bandage is wrapped around one shin, and he rests his weight on the other leg. The horse and man stand on a curving spit of brown earth. A spring-green landscape dips down behind them, running low near the bottom edge of the painting. The horizon comes about a quarter of the way up the composition, and fog-gray and white clouds create thin screens across the topaz-blue sky. The loose brushstrokes are visible in some areas, especially in the landscape and clothing. The artist signed his name in Greek near the lower right corner.
El Greco, Saint Martin and the Beggar, 1597/1599, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.25

Saint Martin and the Beggar

El Greco · 1597/1599 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1942.9.25

A young woman with pale, peachy skin, wearing a long, flowing white dress, stands in front of a white curtain in this vertical portrait painting. Her auburn-red hair cascades down over and behind her shoulders. She looks to our left with green eyes, and her pink, full lips are closed. Her dress has puffed shoulders above a white-on-white striped pattern on the long sleeves. She stands on an animal pelt; it is not clear whether it is a wolf or a bear. The pelt spans the width of the painting and overlaps a blue patterned carpet. The animal’s mouth gapes to show sharp teeth. Its glassy eyes are wide open, and it seems to look at us. The edges of the animal skin are red. The woman holds a white lily by her side in her left hand, while yellow and purple flowers lie scattered on the pelt.
James McNeill Whistler, Symphony in White, No. 1: The White Girl, 1861-1863, 1872, oil on canvas, Harris Whittemore Collection, 1943.6.2

Symphony in White, No. 1: The White Girl

James McNeill Whistler · 1861-1863, 1872 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1943.6.2

We look slightly down onto a baby tucked into an oval-shaped cradle with a woman sitting on the far side looking down at the child in this vertical painting. Both the woman and baby have light skin. The cradle is draped with a sky-blue, scallop-edged cloth decorated with pink flowers and green leaves. A curtain of the same material is tied above so it hangs down behind the head of the cradle from the top center of the composition. The baby’s dark eyes are wide open, and he seems to gaze ahead. His cheeks are flushed peach, and his coral-pink lips are pressed down in a crescent shape. The baby’s head is wrapped in a white hood with a royal-blue bow or decoration over the right ear, to our left. Two loosely painted, round, salmon-pink shapes on either side of the child suggest hands emerging from the under the white blanket. In his left fist, to our right, the baby holds a white drum on a pumpkin-orange stick, with red and white forms, possibly feathers, at the top. The dark green handle of a pinwheel lies across the baby’s legs in the cradle. Another green, vertical form overlapping the edge of the crib suggests that another toy is clipped or propped there. It is difficult to tell if the pinwheel in the crib has canary-yellow and mauve-pink blades or if there are two, overlapping toys. The woman sits with her back to us but is angled so we see her profile looking down at the baby. Her face is painted with broad strokes of sand brown and parchment white. Her dark hair is pulled back under a white cap, and she wears a charcoal-gray and black, vertically striped dress with a white collar. Her back rests against the slats of a wooden chair, which seems to dissolve into the loosely painted, fawn-brown area in the lower right corner. The cradle sits next to a bed, mostly cut off by the left edge of the painting, with a golden-brown blanket or cover. Eggshell-white cloth seems to hang around the bed and along the wall behind the woman. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes.
Claude Monet, The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son Jean, 1867, oil on canvas, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1983.1.25

The Cradle - Camille with the Artist's Son Jean

Claude Monet · 1867 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1983.1.25

We look across a river at a long, flat bridge that runs parallel to a hazy, city skyline in the distance in this horizontal painting. The scene is painted with visible dashes and strokes of mostly pastel blue, ivory white, muted mauve purple, and navy blue. The flat bridge spans the width of the composition along the horizon, which comes a third of the way up the canvas. The sky above is filled with clouds painted in muted tones of cream white, pale blue, and a few touches of shell pink, which mirror the water below. Along the horizon, buildings with spires and towers stretch from our right about two-thirds of the way across the canvas. To our left, a cluster of several boats, tiny in scale, gather near the bridge. Closer, and to our right, three larger ferries are crowded with passengers who are represented by minuscule daubs of brightly colored paint, mostly in black, golden yellow, crimson red, sky and cobalt blue, and ivory white. These boats are painted in short, flat brushstrokes in bands of flame red and midnight blue. The artist signed and dated the work at the lower left: "C. Pissarro, 1890."
Camille Pissarro, Charing Cross Bridge, London, 1890, oil on canvas, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1985.64.32

Charing Cross Bridge, London

Camille Pissarro · 1890 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1985.64.32

From a grassy embankment, we look across a placid body of water to a cluster of cream-white buildings on the far bank in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is painted with blended strokes, giving it a soft and hazy look. Closest to us, dots of canary yellow, sky blue, and white suggest flowers growing on the verdant embankment. Closer to the water, two trees have ash-brown trunks and canopies like clouds of pale sage green. To our left of the trees, a light-skinned woman stands near the water with a bundle on her back. She wears a straw-yellow cap, a shin-length dress, and an apron. A second person wearing a yellow cap and a blue shirt sits facing away from us, to our right of the trees. Buildings and trees along the far bank are reflected in the pale blue water. The villa there is made up of several interconnected buildings with rectangular windows and shallow, gabled, charcoal-gray roofs. One more building is nestled into the trees that surround the complex, to our right. Painted with a few strokes of ocean blue, gray, or pale yellow, at least three people stand or walk along the far bank. The forest stretches across the horizon, which comes a third of the way up the canvas. A few small, puffy white clouds drift across the expanse of blue sky above. The artist signed the painting with black letters in the lower left corner, “Corot.”
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Ville-d'Avray, c. 1865, oil on canvas, Gift of Count Cecil Pecci-Blunt, 1955.9.1

Ville-d'Avray

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot · c. 1865 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1955.9.1