Corot: Women

Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris
February 8–July 22, 2018

National Gallery of Art 
September 9 through December 31, 2018
 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot
The Muse: History, c. 1865
oil on canvas
overall: 46 × 35.2 cm (18 1/8 × 13 7/8 in.) framed: 73.7 × 61 × 11.5 cm (29 × 24 × 4 1/2 in.)
Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, H.O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929

Dressed in rustic Italian costume or nude on a grassy plain, rendered with a sophisticated use of color and a deft, delicate touch, Corot's women convey a mysterious sense of their inner lives. Corot: Women features 44 paintings created between the 1840s and the early 1870s: nudes, individual figures in costumes, and an allegorical series of the model in the studio. The National Gallery of Art is the only venue for Corot: Women, on view from September 9 through December 31, 2018.

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Woman Reading in the Studio, c. 1868 (detail), oil on paperboard on wood, overall: 32.5 x 41.3 cm (12 13/16 x 16 1/4 in.) framed: 50.5 x 59.1 x 6.4 cm (19 7/8 x 23 1/4 x 2 1/2 in.) National Gallery of Art, Washington, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon.

"Recognized as a great master of landscape painting, Corot is among the best represented artists in the Gallery's collection of 19th-century French art. This unique exhibition presents an opportunity to examine a smaller and less well-known aspect of his career," said Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art. "We are grateful to The Edwin L. Cox Exhibition Fund, as well as Leonard and Elaine Silverstein, who helped to make this exhibition possible."

One of the greatest landscape painters of the 19th century, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot (1796–1875) bridged the French neoclassical tradition and the impressionist movement of the 1870s. His figure paintings constitute a much smaller and less well-known portion of his oeuvre, but are of equal importance to the history of art, in particular for the founders of modernist painting, such as Paul Cézanne, Pablo Picasso, and Georges Braque. Corot: Women both distills and expands upon the Musée Marmottan Monet's exhibition Corot: The Painter and His Models (Paris, February 8–July 22, 2018).

About the Exhibition

Corot: Women focuses on Corot's images of women painted throughout his career but rarely exhibited in his lifetime. Corot's figural oeuvre is comprised largely of three major motifs: nudes, single figures in costume posed three-quarter and full-length, and a late series of allegories focused on his studio. The model served a series of established poetic types: modern, Italian, or Greek women reading, seated or walking; women at wells; girls weaving crowns of flowers; women playing mandolins or tambourines, seated or standing, in an interior or against a landscape.

The costumed, single-figure works make up the largest component of Corot's figural paintings. They range from vaguely neoclassical images of models in muted tones, antique garb, and simplified compositions, such as

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

The Blonde Gascon, c. 1850

oil on canvas

overall: 40.01 x 30.16 cm (15 3/4 x 11 7/8 in.)

Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Purchased with the Drayton Hillyer Fund

Photo by Stephen Petegorsky

The Blonde Gascon (c. 1850),

to more romantic evocations of sitters in richly colored exotic dress, as depicted in

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Young Woman in a Pink Skirt, c. 1845–1850

oil on canvas

overall: 47.8 x 39.3 cm (18 13/16 x 15 1/2 in.)

framed: 71.12 x 62.87 x 7.62 cm (28 x 24 3/4 x 3 in.)

Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown

Image © Sterling and Francine Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA (photo by Michael Agee)

Young Woman in a Pink Skirt (c. 1845–1850). Incorporating Corot's sophisticated color sensibility in the costume details, each work conveys a distinct feminine subjectivity.

In the mid-1850s the nude became a way for Corot to give a new direction to his career and to establish himself as more than a landscape painter. Corot's engagement with the traditional genre of the nude was complicated by the shifting social position of artists' models and the incursion of photography into artistic practice in France's Second Empire.

Corot's studio, recognized by his contemporaries as essential to understanding his method and the meaning of his art, embodied his artistic aspirations and achievements. Beginning around 1865 Corot transcribed and reinvented his studio in a group of paintings that reference the studio's broader artistic and cultural significance. More than just a working space, Corot's studio was integral to his identity and was a recurring theme in his art, especially in the final decade of his life.

Three highlights in this exhibition are from the Gallery's collection:

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Agostina, 1866

oil on canvas

overall: 132.4 x 97.6 cm (52 1/8 x 38 7/16 in.)

framed: 173.7 x 138.4 cm (68 3/8 x 54 1/2 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Chester Dale Collection

Agostina (1866), Corot's largest figure painting;  

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

The Repose, 1860, reworked c. 1865/1870

oil on canvas

overall: 57.8 x 101.6 cm (22 3/4 x 40 in.)

framed: 83.8 x 127.3 x 12.1 cm (33 x 50 1/8 x 4 3/4 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Corcoran Collection (William A. Clark Collection)

The Repose (1860, reworked c. 1865/1870), the only female nude he exhibited publicly;

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Corot's Studio: Woman Seated before an Easel, a Mandolin in Her Hand, c. 1868

oil on wood

overall: 61.8 x 40 cm (24 5/16 x 15 3/4 in.)

framed: 78.4 x 56.5 cm (30 7/8 x 22 1/4 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Widener Collectio

and Corot's Studio: Woman Seated before an Easel, a Mandolin in Her Hand (c. 1868), which is the most resolved from his series of studio paintings.

Corot's female figures hover between the sitter's likeness, art historical precedents, and formal innovations, resulting in mysterious images that go beyond the generic categories of portraiture, allegory, and erotica.

Exhibition Curator

The exhibition is curated by Mary Morton, curator and head of the department of French paintings at the National Gallery of Art, Washington.

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Gypsy Girl with Mandolin, c. 1870

oil on canvas

overall: 63.5 x 50.8 cm (25 x 20 in.)

framed: 87 x 75.6 x 9.5 cm (34 1/4 x 29 3/4 x 3 3/4 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of Count Cecil Pecci-Blunt

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Italian Girl, c. 1872

oil on canvas

overall: 65 x 54.5 cm (25 9/16 x 21 7/16 in.)

framed: 94.9 x 84.5 x 11.4 cm (37 3/8 x 33 1/4 x 4 1/2 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Gift of the Avalon Foundation

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Interrupted Reading, c. 1870

oil on canvas mounted on board

overall: 92.23 x 65.09 cm (36 5/16 x 25 5/8 in.)

framed: 131 x 104 x 14 cm (51 9/16 x 40 15/16 x 5 1/2 in.)

The Art Institute of Chicago, Potter Balmer Collection

The Art Institute of Chicago / Art Resource, NY

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Juive d'Alger, c. 1870

oil on canvas

overall: 81.9 x 64.8 cm (32 1/4 x 25 1/2 in.)

Private Collector

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Melancholy, c. 1860

oil on canvas

overall: 48 x 36 cm (18 7/8 x 14 3/16 in.)

framed: 75.2 x 63.2 x 11 cm (29 5/8 x 24 7/8 x 4 5/16 in.)

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Wounded Eurydice, c. 1868–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 60.64 x 45.4 cm (23 7/8 x 17 7/8 in.)

Minneapolis Institute of Art, Bequest of Mrs. Egil Boeckmann

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman with a Large Toque and a Mandolin, c. 1850–1855

oil on canvas

overall: 112 x 88 cm (44 1/8 x 34 5/8 in.)

Private Collection

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Young Woman at The Fountain, c. 1860

oil on canvas

overall: 65 x 42 cm (25 9/16 x 16 9/16 in.)

Musée d'Art d'Historie de Genève

© Musées d’art et d’histoire, Ville de Genève, Dépôt de la Fondation Jean-Louis Prévost & de laFondation Gandur pour l’art, Genève, 1875, n° inv. BA 2010-0001, photo by Bettina Jacot-Descombes

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Bohemian Woman at a Fountain, c. 1865–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 58.1 x 42.86 cm (22 7/8 x 16 7/8 in.)

Philadelphia Museum of Art, The George W. Elkins Collection, 1924

The Philadelphia Museum of Art / Art Resource, NY

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

The Crown of Flowers, c. 1865–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 64.8 x 43.2 cm (25 1/2 x 17 in.)

framed: 91.44 x 49.53 x 10.16 cm (36 x 19 1/2 x 4 in.)

The Baltimore Museum of Art, The Helen and Abram Eisenberg Collection

Photo by Mitro Hood

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Springtime of Life, 1871

oil on canvas

overall: 105.09 x 74.61 cm (41 3/8 x 29 3/8 in.)

Minneapolis Institute of Art, Bequest of Mrs. Erasmus C. Lindley in memory of her father, James J. Hill

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Diana and Actaeon (Diana Surprised in Her Bath), 1836

oil on canvas

overall: 156.53 x 112.71 cm (61 5/8 x 44 3/8 in.)

Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Robert Lehman Collection, 1975

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Marietta (Roman Odalisque), 1843

oil on paper mounted on canvas

overall: 29.3 x 44.2 cm (11 9/16 x 17 3/8 in.)

framed: 49 x 63 x 8 cm (19 5/16 x 24 13/16 x 3 1/8 in.)

Petit Palais, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris

 

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Bacchante with a Panther, 1860, reworked c. 1865–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 55 x 95 cm (21 5/8 x 37 3/8 in.)

framed: 81 x 121 x 9 cm (31 7/8 x 47 5/8 x 3 9/16 in.)

Collection of Shelburne Museum, Anonymous gift in memory of Harry Payne Bingham

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Bacchante by the Sea, 1865

oil on wood

overall: 38.74 x 59.37 cm (15 1/4 x 23 3/8 in.)

framed: 54 x 75 x 7 cm (21 1/4 x 29 1/2 x 2 3/4 in.)

Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, H.O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O.Havemeyer, 1929

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Saint Sébastien, c. 1850–1860

oil on canvas

overall: 90 x 60.5 cm (35 7/16 x 23 13/16 in.)

Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lyon

© Lyon MBA - Photo RMN / Ojeda-Le Mage

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman with a Pearl, c. 1868–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 70 x 55 cm (27 9/16 x 21 5/8 in.)

framed: 93 x 74.5 x 9 cm (36 5/8 x 29 5/16 x 3 9/16 in.)

Musée du Louvre, Paris, Départment des Peintures

© RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY, photo by Stephane Marechalle

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Young Greek Woman, c. 1870–1871

oil on canvas

overall: 84.14 x 70.49 cm (33 1/8 x 27 3/4 in.)

framed: 102.3 x 73.7 x 10.8 cm (40 1/4 x 29 x 4 1/4 in.)

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Mademoiselle de Foudras, 1872

oil on canvas

overall: 88.9 x 59.3 cm (35 x 23 3/8 in.)

Lent by Glasgow Life (Glasgow Museums) on behalf of Glasgow City Council. Presented by Trustees of DWT Cargill, 1950

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman with a Pink Shawl, c. 1865–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 66.7 x 55.2 cm (26 1/4 x 21 3/4 in.)

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Henry C. and Martha B. Angell Collection

Photograph © 2018 Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Sibylle, c. 1870

oil on canvas

overall: 81.92 x 64.77 cm (32 1/4 x 25 1/2 in.)

framed: 95.7 x 83 x 7.5 cm (37 11/16 x 32 11/16 x 2 15/16 in.)

Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, H.O. Havemeyer Collection, Bequest of Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, 1929

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Italian Woman (Woman with the Yellow Sleeve), c. 1870

oil on canvas

overall: 73 x 59 cm (28 3/4 x 23 1/4 in.)

framed: 87 x 57.4 x 13.5 cm (34 1/4 x 22 5/8 x 5 5/16 in.)

The National Gallery, London, Accepted in lieu of Inheritance Tax by HM Government from the estate of Lucian Freud and allocated to the National Gallery, 2012

© The National Gallery, London

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman with a Mandolin, c. 1860–1865

oil on canvas

overall: 51.4 x 40.3 cm (20 1/4 x 15 7/8 in.)

framed: 69.2 x 59.4 x 7 cm (27 1/4 x 23 3/8 x 2 3/4 in.)

Saint Louis Art Museum, Museum Purchase

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman Reading in the Country, c. 1868–1870

oil on canvas

overall: 54.3 x 37.5 cm (21 3/8 x 14 3/4 in.)

framed: 76 x 61 x 9 cm (29 15/16 x 24 x 3 9/16 in.)

Lent by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Gift of Louise Senff Cameron, in memory of her uncle,Charles H. Senff, 1928

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

Woman Reading in The Studio, c. 1868

oil on paperboard on wood

overall: 32.5 x 41.3 cm (12 13/16 x 16 1/4 in.)

framed: 50.5 x 59.1 x 6.4 cm (19 7/8 x 23 1/4 x 2 1/2 in.)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

The Lady in Blue, 1874

oil on canvas

overall: 80 x 50.5 cm (31 1/2 x 19 7/8 in.)

framed: 125.5 x 95.5 x 16.5 cm (49 7/16 x 37 5/8 x 6 1/2 in.)

Musée du Louvre, Paris, Départment des Peintures

© RMN-Grand Palais / Art Resource, NY, photo by Stephane Marechalle