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Portrait of a nude woman looking left

Soft black lines on textured gray paper show a nude middle-aged woman from the torso up. Posed in three quarter profile, she leans forward slightly, looking up and to the left. Her left hand is raised to her neck, with her thumb resting on her collarbone, her forefinger extended and touching her chin, and her other fingers folded under her hand. Her hair is tinted with pale orange color and touches of white highlight her cheeks, forehead and arm. A shawl is loosely wrapped around her back and elbows.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
1940.2
People
Hilaire-Germain-Edgar Degas, French (Paris, France 1834 - 1917 Paris, France)
Title
Half-Length Study of a Woman
Classification
Drawings
Work Type
drawing
Date
c. 1890
Culture
French
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/298418

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Charcoal and pastel on blue-gray wove paper
Dimensions
57.5 x 50.8 cm (22 5/8 x 20 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • Signed: Black crayon, l.r.: Degas
  • inscription: l.r., crayon, signed, in artist's hand: Degas

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Atelier Degas, sold [through Vente II, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, December 11-13, 1918, no. 126]. Paul Rosenberg. Paul J. Sachs. [Jacques Seligmann & Co., New York] to; Fogg Art Museum, 1940 [in exchange]

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Arthur Sachs
Accession Year
1940
Object Number
1940.2
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Carol Rothschild, "Recent Museum Acquisitions", Parnassus, College Art Association of America (May 1940), Vol. 12, No. 5, pp. 46-50, 56, p. 48
  • Agnes Mongan and Paul J. Sachs, Drawings in the Fogg Museum of Art, Harvard University Press (Cambridge, 1940), vol. 1, cat. no. 671, fig. 347
  • Paul André Lemoisne, Degas et son Oeuvre, Paul Brame and Cesar M. de Hauke (Paris, France, 1946-1949), vol. III, no. 798, repr.
  • Jean Sutherland Boggs, Portraits by Degas, University of California Press (Berkeley, CA, 1962), pl. 131
  • Franco Russoli and Fiorella Minervino, L'opera completa di Degas, Rizzoli Editore (Milan, Italy, 1970), fig. 627
  • Pia Desantis, "Study of the Five Degas Pastels in the Fogg Art Museum" (thesis (certificate in conservation), Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies, July 1985), Unpublished, pp. 1-94 passim
  • Marjorie B. Cohn and Jean Sutherland Boggs, Degas at Harvard, exh. cat., Harvard University Art Museums/Yale University Press (Cambridge and New Haven, 2005), cat. no. 24, fig. 32 (color), pp. 64, 75 note 116
  • Catalogue des tableaux, pastels et dessins par Edgar Degas et provenant de son atelier 2e vente, December 11-13, 1918, auct. cat., Galerie Georges Petit (Paris, France, December 11 - December 13, 1918), no. 126
  • Hannelore Fischer and Alexandra von dem Knesebeck, "Paris bezauberte mich..." Käthe Kollwitz und die französische Moderne, exh. cat., Käthe Kollwitz Museum Köln (Cologne, 2010), p. 125, repr. p. 125 as pl. 121

Exhibition History

  • Exhibition of Drawings by Degas, Jacques Seligmann & Co., New York, 10/27/1930 - 11/15/1930
  • Degas, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 05/09/1931 - 05/30/1931
  • Drawings by Degas, City Art Museum of St. Louis, St. Louis, 01/01/1932 - 12/31/1932
  • Edgar Degas: Paintings, Drawings, Pastels, Sculpture, Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, 11/28/1933 - 12/18/1933
  • Nineteenth-Century French Paintings (?), Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington, 11/17/1942 - 12/08/1942
  • Edgar Degas Bronzes, Drawings, Pastels, Buchholz Gallery, New York, 01/03/1945 - 01/27/1945
  • Drawings by Degas, Farnsworth Art Museum (now Davis Museum and Cultural Center), Wellesley, 02/16/1946 - 03/10/1946
  • Degas at Harvard, Harvard University Art Museums, Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 08/01/2005 - 11/27/2005

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu