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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.”

Pablo Picasso

Madame Picasso, 1923

East Building, Ground Level — Gallery 103-B

Medium

oil on linen

Dimensions

overall: 100.3 x 82 cm (39 1/2 x 32 5/16 in.)

framed: 123.2 x 104.5 x 5.7 cm (48 1/2 x 41 1/8 x 2 1/4 in.)

Credit Line

Chester Dale Collection

Accession Number

1963.10.194

Artists / Makers

Pablo Picasso (artist) Spanish, 1881 - 1973

Image Use

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Copyright

Inscription

upper right: Picasso / 23

Provenance

Purchased from the artist by Paul Rosenberg, Paris;[1] sold 5 June 1930 to Chester Dale [1883-1962], New York; bequest 1963 to NGA.

[1] Provenance compiled from information in object file (1963.10.194) in NGA curatorial records. Object file does not indicate whether Rosenberg purchased painting as a dealer or for private collection. When purchased directly from the artist, it is assumed here that the painting became part of his private collection.

Associated Names

Dale, Chester
Rosenberg, Paul

Exhibition History

1923: Art Institute of Chicago, 1923.

1923: Wildenstein Galleries, New York, 1923.

1931: Picasso-Braque-Léger, Museum of French Art, New York, 1931, no. 8.

1931: Portraits of Women, Romanticism to Surrealism, Museum of French Art, New York, 1931, no. 27.

1943: Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection, Art Institute of Chicago, 1943-1952 (extended loan), unnumbered catalogue, repro. p. 51

1952: Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1952, no. 54, repro.

1965: The Chester Dale Bequest, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1965, unnumbered checklist.

1978: Aspects of Twentieth-Century Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1978-1979, no. 30, repro.

2010: From Impressionism to Modernism: The Chester Dale Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, January 2010-January 2012, unnumbered catalogue, repro.

Bibliography

1932: Zervos, Christian. Pablo Picasso. 33 vols. Paris, 1932-1978: 5(1952): no. 29, pl. 18.

1943: Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. The Art Institute of Chicago, 1943:, 51, repro.

1952: Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1952 (2nd ed., 1960; rev. ed., 1965): 54, repro.

1960: Twentieth Century French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1960 (2nd ed.): 56, repro.

1965: Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 102.

1965: Twentieth Century French Paintings & Sculpture of the French School in the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965 (rev. ed.): 75, repro.

1968: National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 90, repro.

1975: European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 266, repro.

1984: Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 608, no. 942, color repro.

1985: European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 307, repro.

1997: Bohart, Arthur C., and Leslie S. Greenberg. Empathy Reconsidered, New Directions in Psychotherapy, Washington, D.C., 1997: cover repro.