French Paintings 1890–1950

On View: East Building, Ground Level

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60 artworks on view.

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Shown from the knees up, young woman with ivory-white skin sits facing us in a brown armchair with her hands loosely clasped in her lap in this vertical portrait painting. Her hair is parted in the middle and gathered at the back of her head. Her head is turned to our left, and she looks off into the distance with dark brown eyes under thin, arched brows. She has a long nose and a pale, petite mouth. Her steel-blue dress has elbow-length sleeves and a brown fur collar. The blue dress is marked with off-white, zigzagging lines, and shadows are created with gray smudges. The armchair frames her torso, being just taller than her shoulders and wider than her arms. The chair, her hair, and collar are all ginger brown. Wavy lines and angled strokes of smoke gray and black delineate the texture of her hair, collar, and folds of her dress. Her facial features, clothing, and the chair are outlined in black and set against a taupe background. The artist has signed and dated in the upper right, “Picasso 23.”

Madame Picasso

Pablo Picasso

1923

Oil on linen  Accession ID  1963.10.194

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
A child and man stand facing away from us in this vertical painting. The scene is painted with visible dabs, stipples, and strokes of paint, and many details, especially in the distance, are indistinct. A young girl is to the left, a blue band holding back her long brown hair. Despite the title of this painting, Child Wearing a Red Scarf, she wears a bulky, pumpkin-orange scarf around her neck over an ankle-length dress dotted with red. Streaks of brown suggest shoes under the lower hem. The person to our right wears dark trousers, a brown, long-sleeved shirt, and olive-green shoes outlined with black. This person’s right leg and head above the shoulders are cropped by the composition. A peach area suggests that the girl holds the hand or something by the man’s pants pocket but this area is difficult to read. The ground is ecru white, and loosely painted forms along the top of the composition suggest people standing and the room in the distance. The artist signed to top right corner, “E Vuillard.”

Child Wearing a Red Scarf

Edouard Vuillard

c. 1891

Oil on cardboard  Accession ID  1970.17.90

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
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This vertical portrait painting shows the head and shoulders of a person with pale peach skin and an auburn, cheek-length bob hairstyle. The person has high cheek bones, deep pink lips, and an angular, pointed chin. The head is cocked to our left, and almond-shaped eyes are nearly blacked out. The black jacket has lapels over a white, collared, buttoned-up shirt with a crimson-red necktie. Shown against brick-red and black background, the portrait is painted with areas of relatively flat color but with loose brushstrokes that create a textured, mottled effect. The artist signed the work with black paint in the lower right corner: “modigliani.” 

Madame Kisling

Amedeo Modigliani

c. 1917

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.175

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
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A balding man with peach-colored skin and a drooping white mustache is surrounded by flowers floating in a blue sky with apricot-colored clouds in this vertical painting. He is shown from the waist up facing us at the bottom center. He seems to wear a midnight blue tunic over a white shirt, but his clothing is loosely painted. He looks down to our right, and his head is surrounded by an area of brownish gold to create a halo-like effect. Upon closer inspection, the peach clouds turn out to be areas of bare canvas. A sunflower, orange flowers, and a cluster of white and red flowers float in the space around the man. Some areas are thinly painted, and strokes are visible throughout.

Evocation of Roussel

Odilon Redon

c. 1912

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.203

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
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Shown from the lap up, a person with peach-colored skin sits facing us as he looks down and to our left in this vertical, stylized, portrait painting. The person’s clothing and features are outlined with thin black lines, and areas are filled in with mottled, streaked color painted with visible strokes. The person has a round face with a double chin and a small red mouth. The eyes are painted as slate-blue slivers under thin brows, one of which is cocked. The man’s short black hair is parted to one side and combed across the top of his head. He wears a white cravat tied at his neck under a rust-red jacket or shirt. Two rounded, muted blue forms below suggest crossed knees. The man’s right elbow rests next to his body, and that hand is near his lap. The background is painted with pecan brown on the left third and gray-blue on the right two-thirds.

Monsieur Deleu

Amedeo Modigliani

1916

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.76

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
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Abstracted objects, including a guitar, vase, papers, and playing cards, are gathered on a tabletop in this horizontal still life painting. The objects are made up of areas of mostly flat color and many are outlined in black, creating the impression that the some shapes are two-dimensional and assembled almost like a collage. The brown table has an oval top and a curving pedestal foot. At the center of the jumble on the tabletop, a guitar lies on its side with the neck facing us and reaching to our right. Beneath the black fretboard and neck, the curving form of the guitar is painted tomato red. The upper half is represented by a squared-off brown form. The guitar seems to rest atop or in front of an array of stacked shapes, like splayed pieces of paper, in white, lavender purple, and pale blue. A curving form painted in turquoise to our left seems to be a vase holding a spray of three flowers. The vase is shown against a white square painted with horizontal black lines, like sheet music. A dark gray form at the middle of the table, beneath the guitar, could be the silhouette of a bird facing our left. Just to the right of the bird, a pair of playing cards lie on a blue area. Painted in turquoise against gray, one card has six dots and the other one club. A chair with a curved, arching top and a gray upholstered seat is pulled up to the table to our right. The front left leg is light gray with turned knobs near the foot and halfway up the leg; the right leg is painted black, as if in shadow. Panels of pale tan suggest wainscotting behind the table beneath a pale gray wall across the background. The overall impression of the painting is fragmented as even single objects seem to be broken up into planes and areas of color. The artist signed and underlined his name with red paint in the lower left corner: “Picasso.”

Still Life

Pablo Picasso

1918

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.195

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
A wood table is piled with stylized and abstracted objects, including a jug, lemons, a knife, guitar, newspaper, and a smoking pipe in this horizontal still life painting. The objects are made up of areas of mostly flat color and many are outlined in black, creating the impression that some shapes are two-dimensional and assembled almost like a collage. We look down onto the top of the table and at the front, where the grain of the wood is painted in tan against a lighter background. Concentric black and white circles make up the knob on the face of the table’s single drawer. There are two rows of objects on the table. Along the front, near the left corner of the table, the knife hangs with its blade slightly over the open drawer. A newspaper with the title “LE JOUR” rests next to the knife. Next to the newspaper are two yellow pieces of fruit, near the front right corner of the table. Behind the fruit, the right third of the pitcher is marine blue and the left two thirds is mostly straw yellow, with one round olive-green area near the handle. Next to the pitcher is a tobacco pipe, and, at the back left edge of the table, the guitar. The instrument rests on its side so the front of the soundboard faces the viewer, and the neck extends to our left. The instrument is bisected lengthwise into two halves that appear to be spliced together, and the edges and features of the halves are not symmetrical or aligned with each other. The bottom half of the guitar is painted a beige color, and is curved like a typical guitar body. The top half is painted black, and the contour of the instrument’s body rises into two pointed peaks instead of mirroring the rounded forms below. The sound hole is markedly smaller on the bottom half, and the two halves of the hole do not exactly line up. A rectangular form behind the table could be a screen. The left side is fern green, the right side black. Behind the screen is a wallpapered wall above wood paneling. The wallpaper is patterned with teardrop shapes, dots, and zigzagging lines in fawn brown against parchment white. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower right corner, “G Braque 29.”

Still Life: Le Jour

Georges Braque

1929

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.91

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
This painting shows five people in an indoor setting: two adults and three children. In the center, a woman is seated next to a piece of red-brown furniture, holding a baby in a long white garment with a wide neckline. Another woman stands beside her on the right, turned toward the baby. Both women have brown hair styled up and wear black dresses. On the left, a child in a black garment appears to sit next to the seated woman, reaching towards the baby. In the bottom right corner, another baby wearing a white garment seems to be seated, facing the left. All of the people have pale skin. The background is abstract, with brown and green shapes suggesting a wall and a doorway on the left. The background is filled with thin, scribbled lines, and the brushstrokes in the painting are thick and visible.

The Artist's Sister and Her Children

Pierre Bonnard

1898

Oil on cardboard on wood  Accession ID  1970.17.6

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
A geranium with vibrant pink blossoms sits in a terracotta pot on a ledge in front of two shelves in this stylized, vertical still life painting. The orange terracotta pot has patches of vivid spring green around its base. The rounded leaves of the plant and petals of the blossom are outlined in black and filled in with areas of parakeet and moss green for the leaves and pink for the petals. The pot sits on a bright, lavender-purple ledge, and two more shelves are stacked behind it. A single terracotta pot sits to our left behind the plant on the lower shelf, and four pots are lined up on the shelf above, cut off by the top edge of the canvas. Brushstrokes are visible throughout. A turquoise strip runs along the bottom edge of the composition, and the artist signed the lower right corner, “Henri Matisse.”

Pot of Geraniums

Henri Matisse

1912

Oil on linen  Accession ID  1963.10.41

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
Shown from the chest up, a young woman with peach-colored skin standing angled to our left takes up right two-thirds of this vertical portrait painting. Her blond hair is accentuated with strokes of tawny brown and gathered at the back of her head. A long tendril cascades down her back. She is lit from the upper left, which casts the back of her head in shadow. Her eyes are downcast, and her long nose and small mouth are set in a round face. She wears an almost sheer white, sleeveless dress with a low scooped neckline. A background painted with long streaks of fawn brown and tan fills the space behind her. The artist signed and dated in the upper right, “Picasso 22.”

Classical Head

Pablo Picasso

1922

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.189

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
This painting is a portrait of a person standing with their legs slightly bent and their hands on their hips, looking towards us. Their facial features are abstract, with pale orange skin, prominent ears, arched eyebrows, a pointed chin, and slightly pursed lips. The person has short dark hair and is wearing a red vest over a white shirt with a high collar, black sleeves, and black pants. The background is a deep blue. The brushstrokes, especially those in the background, are thick and visible.

Portrait of a Boy

Chaim Soutine

1928

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1963.10.216

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103
Abstracted sailboats are painted with triangles, squares, stripes, and streaks of mustard yellow, crimson red, mint green, black, and white against a field of vivid cobalt blue, which is the dominant color in this nearly square painting. The water is painted mostly with straight, parallel, horizontal strokes. V and W-shaped squiggles near the top center suggest sunlight glinting off the water at the horizon line, which comes about four-fifths of the way up the canvas. The sky is painted with longer horizontal strokes in shades of cobalt and baby blue. A triangular area of aqua along the right edge of the canvas could be shallow water or land. A double row of colorful square and rectangular nautical flags rise vertically up either side of a mast to left of center. Each is different: for instance, one has green and red stripes, another black and white checkers, while another is crossed with the Union Jack of the United Kingdom. White sails and other flags fill the water across the composition. The artist signed and dated the painting, along with the location, in the lower left corner: "Cowes 1934 Raoul Dufy."

Regatta at Cowes

Raoul Dufy

1934

Oil on linen  Accession ID  1970.17.30

On View: East Building Ground Level, Gallery E103

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