Description
Seated Nude is an oil on canvas painted by Amedeo Modigliani in about 1916; the original measures 92.4 × 59.8 cm and belongs to the Courtauld Gallery in London. Our canvas painting is a hand-painted copy of that work: an academy-trained painter makes it in oil on cotton canvas, in eight sizes from 40 × 60 cm to 120 × 180 cm or in the size you specify, and before dispatch we photograph it and send you the photograph for approval.
| Title: | Seated Nude |
| Other titles: | Female Nude (at the gallery) · Nu assis |
| Painter: | Amedeo Modigliani (1884–1920) |
| Year: | about 1916 |
| Original size (height × width): | 92.4 × 59.8 cm, portrait format |
| Original technique: | Oil on canvas |
| Painting style: | Modern art, École de Paris |
| Where it is: | The Courtauld Gallery, London – the public collections record |
| Our reproduction: | hand-painted oil on canvas, eight sizes from 40 × 60 cm to 120 × 180 cm; one of them, 60 × 92 cm, is the original’s measurement to within four millimetres |
Seated Nude – Amedeo Modigliani
What is on the canvas?
The canvas is upright and the figure fills it. A woman sits facing us, the head inclined onto her own shoulder and the eyes closed, so the picture is turned inward rather than out. Her hair is dark, long and heavy, falling forward over one shoulder and back behind the other. The skin is a pale warm cream with a soft rose in the cheeks and the breasts, laid on thinly, and the body runs from the lower edge to the neck as one unbroken column with the head closing it at the top. The arms hang at the sides; one hand appears low at the right. Behind her the ground is divided in two: a grey-green field at the left with a horizontal blue-grey band across it, and a deep red-maroon drape at the right that follows the line of her back. There are no objects, no furniture and no window. It is a post-impressionist painting in the sense in which post-impressionism meant building a body out of contour and flat colour rather than out of the light in a room. In Paris Modigliani belonged to that circle of immigrant painters we now call the École de Paris.
Where is the original today?
In the Courtauld Gallery in London. The collection record titles it Female Nude and dates it to about 1916; the measurement is 92.4 by 59.8 centimetres. Earlier versions of this page named no institution at all, because the one previously printed here could not be confirmed and we would rather leave a field empty than fill it with a guess. It is confirmed now, and the row is filled.
Which Seated Nude is this?
We sell two paintings called Seated Nude and they are different canvases. This is the 1916 one in London: 92.4 × 59.8 cm, dark hair, the head inclined and the eyes shut. The other is Seated Nude of 1918 in the Honolulu Museum of Art, slightly larger at 100.3 × 64.8 cm, with short coppery hair, open eyes and the hands resting one over the other in the lap. The quickest test is the eyes: this one is asleep and that one is looking at you.
Beatrice Hastings, and the exhibition the police closed
The collection record names the model as Beatrice Hastings, the English writer who was Modigliani’s companion in these years. We sell his Portrait of Beatrice Hastings as well, and you can compare the faces. We give the identification as the record gives it rather than as settled fact: models for the nudes were often professionals and the naming of them is not always secure. When a group of these nudes was shown at Berthe Weill’s gallery in Paris in December 1917, the only solo exhibition of his lifetime, the police closed it, and the collection record is specific about the objection: the paintings showed pubic hair. The elongation of the face in these years is usually traced to the Egyptian, African and Oceanic sculpture he studied in the ethnographic museum in Paris.
What do the photographs on this page show?
All four photographs show our own hand-painted canvas in the workshop, not the original. The first photograph shows the finished work square-on and whole, framed in a dark brown moulding with a gold inner line and standing on an easel. The second photograph shows the same canvas at an angle, so you can see the depth of the frame, with racks of other framed works behind it. The third photograph is a close view of the head and shoulder: the closed lids with the lashes drawn on them, the red mouth, the dark hair against the grey ground. The fourth photograph is a close view of the torso, where the grey-green ground meets the red drape and the weave of the canvas is visible through the paint. The frame shown is one of many; you choose it yourself.
How is our hand-painted version made?
The work is made by an academy-trained painter in oil on cotton canvas over a wooden frame. It is not a print: every stroke is laid by hand, and your canvas always differs a little from any other. Here the drawing matters more than the colour. The body is one long contour from the hip to the jaw, and if the line of the neck and shoulders is out by a few millimetres the whole posture goes with it — the figure stops leaning and starts slumping. The second difficulty is the division of the ground: cool grey-green on one side, hot red on the other, and the warm skin has to sit correctly against both at once. When the paint is dry we photograph the work and send the photograph for approval.
Which size for which wall?
The original is 92.4 cm high and 59.8 cm wide, and our 60 × 92 cm is that canvas to within four millimetres, so if you want it at the size Modigliani painted it, that is the rung. The smaller sizes, 40 × 60 and 50 × 80 cm, suit a bedroom, a hallway or a narrow wall. From 70 × 110 and 80 × 120 cm the figure approaches life size, which is how a standing-height nude reads best on a living-room wall. The largest, 90 × 140, 100 × 150 and 120 × 180 cm, want a free wall and about three metres of distance. Hang it with the centre around 145 cm above the floor. The picture is quiet and cool with one hot area, so it holds a white, grey or pale blue wall.
Custom size, stretcher and frame
If your wall asks for a size that is not listed, we will make it. Give us the width and height in centimetres; we check whether the proportion carries the composition and tell you what changes at the edges. Here it shows at the bottom, where the thighs are already cut, and at the right, where the red drape and the hand sit close to the edge; a narrower format loses the drape, and with it the warm half of the picture. It arrives either stretched on a wooden frame, ready to hang, or rolled in a tube, which is cheaper to ship. You pick the frame in our 3D application, which shows it realistically on the work, and on request we set it into a photograph of your wall. If you are looking for a work we do not carry, see our made-to-order paintings.
Delivery and guarantee
We deliver to your address, the canvas clear of the outer wall of the packaging. Lead time depends on size and the workshop load: we estimate it when you order and tell you if it changes. We guarantee workmanship and materials: if the work arrives damaged or does not match the photograph you approved, we repaint it at our cost. Because you see it photographed before it ships, most questions are settled before it leaves.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the original?
In the Courtauld Gallery in London.
What is the accession number?
We do not print one. The collection is confirmed, the number is not, and we quote only what we have checked.
What is the work called at the gallery?
The collection record calls it Female Nude. We carry the fuller description because a bare title would not separate it from the other nudes on this shelf.
When was it painted?
About 1916. The nudes run from that year to about 1918.
Is this a print?
No. Every canvas is painted by hand, in oil. We print nothing.
Do you have the original’s size?
Effectively yes. The original is 92.4 × 59.8 cm and our 60 × 92 cm rung differs by two and four millimetres.
Which size should I choose?
For a bedroom or a hallway, 50 × 80 cm. For a living-room wall, 80 × 120 cm.
Can I have a size that is not on the list?
Yes. Give us the width and height in centimetres; we explain first how the size affects the crop.
How does it arrive?
Stretched on a wooden frame ready to hang, or rolled in a tube. Both travel in protective packaging.
Do the photographs show the original?
No. All four show our own hand-painted canvas, photographed in our workshop.
Which other Modigliani nudes do you have?
See Reclining Nude II and Red Nude. The full choice is in the Amedeo Modigliani gallery, and we have written a longer article about the painter; this canvas also has its own article.
- Subject: a seated female figure, head inclined onto the shoulder, eyes closed, a grey-green ground at the left and a red drape at the right
- Original: 92.4 × 59.8 cm, oil on canvas, about 1916, The Courtauld Gallery, London
- Our version: hand-painted oil on canvas, eight sizes from 40 × 60 to 120 × 180 cm, one of them the original’s measurement to within four millimetres
- Worth knowing: we sell two different paintings called Seated Nude; on this one the eyes are shut, on the 1918 canvas they are open
